NYC NOW - May 30, 2024: Midday News

Episode Date: May 30, 2024

Asghar Ali, 58, of Brooklyn, is facing charges, including attempted murder and a hate crime after allegedly driving onto a sidewalk in East Flatbush on Wednesday and trying to hit a group of young Orthodox Jewish men. Meanwhile, New York City plans to expand its e-scooter rental program into eastern Queens, but some locals aren’t on board. Plus, hurricane season officially starts Saturday in the New York City region. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has forecast a more active-than-usual season this year. WNYC’s Michael Hill speaks with Dan Zarrilli, special advisor for climate and sustainability at Columbia University, about the potential impact on the city.

Welcome to NYC Now, your source for local news in and around New York City from WMYC. It's Thursday, May 30th. Here's the midday news from Michael Hill. A Brooklyn man is facing a long list of charges after he allegedly drove onto a sidewalk yesterday in East Flatbush and tried to hit a group of young Orthodox Jewish men. officials say 58-year-old Asgar Ali drove a white Ford Crown Victoria, where he allegedly yelled, I will kill all the Jews, and try to run over the men as they walked on Glenwood Road near 55th Street.

Police say no one got hurt. Ali is charged with attempted murder as a hate crime and several other crimes. Information for his lawyer is not yet available. New York City plans to expand its e-s scooter rental program into Eastern Queens, WNIC's Julia Haywood reports said not everyone is on board with this. The city's shared e-scooter program allows riders to rent electric scooters for short trips from popular companies like Bird, Lime, and VO. The scooters will be available in neighborhoods like Flushing, Auburndale, and Springfield Gardens.

But local city council member Sandra Ung says residents are concerned about the scooters clogging up sidewalks. I could see how this could be helpful in some of the district, where there is a transportation desert, which I don't understand. I don't understand how this is helpful to disassociate. Elected officials will be rallying outside Flushing Library to denounce the expansion, which is scheduled to launch in June. 67 and partly sunny now. Good scooter and bike riding weather right now.

It looks like we have a stretch of dry weather here. Today, sunshine in 73, with a light wind from the north to keep us cool. Mid-50s and cool tonight. Tomorrow, sunny in 77, this weekend. Sunshine and low 80s. Stay close. There's more after the break. Hurricane season officially starts this Saturday.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA, has forecast a much more active than usual season for this year, and for years, weather-related events, as we know, have taken quite a substantial toll on the city's infrastructure. Joining us now is Dan Zerilli, Special advisor for climate and sustainability at Columbia University. He played a senior role in climate resiliency under former Mayor Bloomberg and most recently served as Chief Climate Policy Advisor under Mayor de Blasio.

Walk us through the different kinds of impacts we can have from hurricanes or major storms around New York City. Yeah, thanks, Michael, for having me on. As Noah has predicted, this is going to be an above-normal season, but I'll always caution that it only really takes one. And so we need to be prepared. It's also really important for New Yorkers to understand that different storms can have different kinds of impacts. There's always this sort of question that comes up in the last, you know, decades since Hurricane Sandy. Are we ready for the next Sandy?

And in reality, the next storm may not be like Sandy at all. We could see storms with surge levels like Sandy with the overland flooding, which would have impacts in many of our coastal areas. but as we saw from a hurricane like Hurricane Ida, that high-intensity rainfall can also have devastating consequences in many low-lying areas of the city that may be far away from the coast, but may have poor infrastructure, they may be former wetlands, it may be where the water wants to go. And of course, hurricanes can also have high wind, and we really haven't seen those kind of impacts in the storm, but we very well could. The sewer infrastructure in New York City is old, OLD, old.

You've seen substantial flooding with recent storms. What kind of improvements have been made over recent years to address this, to prevent the flooding? Because that's a question a lot of New Yorkers have. Because we've seen such high-intensity rainfalls and the intensity getting worse, when Hurricane Henri came in through in 2021, it was a record-breaking rainfall intensity event and tapped out our storm sewer capacity. But then two weeks later, it was Hurricane Ida that broke that record by 50%.

And so we're seeing an acceleration of these kind of impacts. Billions of dollars have been invested over the last several years in continuing to upgrade the gray infrastructure, the sewer systems and the pipes to be able to handle more of that rain. Just as important is the green infrastructure that has been invested in, things like bioswales and tree pits and most notably the blue belt system in Staten Island that is able to handle more water to retain it and also filter it and provide biodiversity benefits. And so there's many different kind of benefits that come from a real mix of both green and gray infrastructure to handle the kinds of rainfall events that we're seeing in the city.

Dan, are you saying then that these improvements, these investments will prevent flooding? What I'm saying is that they are going to continue to reduce that risk and be able to handle more and more. By no means are we ready for the sort of high intensity rainfall events that climate change is going to continue to bring to New York City. but with the investments that have been made, things are getting safer, but we need to see a whole lot more of it. And New Yorkers should absolutely be demanding more of that infrastructure. Mayor Adams has said his administration is working on plans to buy out flood-prone homes in Queens, but the city and state still allow building in flood-prone areas, isn't it right? And so what kind of policy should the city and should the state adopt for such developments?

Things that are being built now are being built to a much higher standard. they're being elevated along our coastline to help protect against flooding. There's a lot of different infrastructure that's being invested in. The real problem is that many of our neighborhoods, of course, were built decades ago or longer. And so we may have inadvertently filled in wetlands. We may have built in areas that were unsafe and have continued to face all sorts of flooding problems across the city. We saw that after Hurricane Sandy. And there was a buyout program in Staten Island that bought out a number of vulnerable properties in those neighborhoods. I think the real challenge with buyout programs, of course, is that they typically tend to be

voluntary. There isn't really an appetite for an eminent domain, you know, forced buyout solution, and that's probably the right answer. But to be able to provide a tool for those who are looking to get out of a vulnerable situation, I think is really important. And it's good that the city is considering the right way to think that through to help New Yorkers understand what their risk is, to provide the tools to reduce that risk. And in some likely limited circumstances where that risk can't be prevented or reduced in a significant way that there is a buyout option for someone to get out of that risk, it's also really important that that isn't just sold to someone else to build more. I think if we're going to buy the property out, it has to

return to nature and help provide some of that more natural green infrastructure solution in those communities as well. And then, along those lines, then, should city and state say there are some areas, we're not going to issue permits to build it? We may come to a point where there are places that we should not be building in or we are unable to insure. And that's really going to be, I think, the important tool that's going to come into effect that's going to really impact these kind of decisions.

If someone can't get homeowners insurance in a particular location, that's going to drive a very different level of decision-making about where and how we build. Dan, are there other places in the country, other places in the world, Europe, Africa, where folks in this region who are making policy should be looking at some of the technology used in these other places and perhaps try to apply them here in this region? Oh, absolutely. I think there are good lessons to be learned all over the globe that we should be continuing to evaluate and bring back here to New York City. Several years ago, New York City signed an agreement with Copenhagen to look at new ways of dealing with cloudburst and high-intensity rainfall.

I think that's a really interesting partnership. Of course, the Dutch have consistently shown new and novel ways of dealing with storm surge and other types of flooding. But it's not just so simple to take someone else's technology and apply it to New York City. We need to make sure it actually works in our communities. And with, you know, whether it's the geology or the land use or, you know, our communities, There's important New York specific factors that have to play into those decisions as well. Our guest has been Daniel Zerilli.

He's a special advisor for climate and sustainability at Columbia University. Dan, thanks for coming on. Thank you, Michael. To stay informed this hurricane season, you can sign up for emergency alerts on the Notify NYCF and find out your evacuation zone in emergency by visiting maps.nysc.gov slash hurricane. Thanks for listening. This is NYC Now. from WMYC.

Be sure to catch us every weekday, three times a day, for your top news headlines and occasional deep dives, and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. See you this evening.