Federal Dollars for Hurricane Defense Have Dried Up
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The federal dollars allocated for shoring up New York City’s defenses against a hurricane have dried up, which a New York congressman calls “insanity.”
Between 2000 and 2006, federal funding for strengthening beaches and building barriers to prevent shoreline erosion in New York City plummeted to zero from just less than $4 million, a report released yesterday by Rep. Anthony Weiner states.
“This is insanity, because you can spend a few million dollars a year or billions for damage repair,” Rep. Jerrold Nadler, whose district includes many flood-prone areas, said during a telephone interview. “The president has got his head in the sand, as if Katrina never happened. The president is behaving like an ostrich.”
New York’s beaches and dunes, which provide the city with its only line of defense against a storm surge, are eroded, a professor of geology at Queens College, Nicholas Coch, said.
“Our only recourse when the big one hits is evacuation,” Mr. Coch said. “We have no defenses.”
During the 1990s the Army Corps of Engineers carried out large earthmoving projects to replenish sand above the waterline along the Rockaway and Coney Island beaches, a civilian with the planning division of the corps, Stephen Couch, said. However, subsequent plans for sea barriers were put on hold recently until federal funding resumes, fact sheets provided by the Army Corps of Engineers state. Messrs. Weiner and Nadler said they consider hurricanes a serious risk to New York City.
The two voiced dissatisfaction with Washington, for slashing funding, and with the city’s emergency planners, due to gaps in the city’s evacuation plan.
Mr. Weiner said the current evacuation plan does not include sufficient provisions for the elderly and bedridden, who would have trouble finding and using public transportation to reach evacuation points.
The city’s Office of Emergency Management needs to develop rosters identifying where high concentrations of elderly live, Mr. Weiner said.
In New Orleans, a number of elderly citizens were abandoned and ended up dying when Hurricane Katrina made landfall last year.
