NYC NOW - Midday News: Officials Warn of Dangerous Weather Conditions, Mayor Eric Adams Proposes Open Primaries, and Staten Island Beaches Offer a Quiet(er) Escape

Episode Date: July 8, 2025

City officials are warning New Yorkers to prepare for dangerous summer weather through Wednesday, with a heat advisory in effect and a flood watch starting Tuesday afternoon. Meanwhile, Mayor Eric Adams is pitching a major shakeup to city elections by introducing “open primaries” where all candidates run together regardless of party. Plus, WNYC’s Liam Quigley explains why Staten Island beaches could be the perfect spot for New Yorkers looking to avoid the crowds.

Welcome to NYC now, your source for local news in and around New York City from WMYC. It's Tuesday, July 8th. Here's the midday news from Michael Hill. City officials are warning us to race for a mix of potentially dangerous summer weather today into tomorrow. Meteorologists are forecasting extreme heat until 8 tonight with feel-like temperatures around 100 degrees. A heat advisory is in effect for our area. Officials say we should check on our neighbors. and avoid strenuous outdoor activity if we can.

There's also a flood watch starting at 2 o'clock this afternoon through 2 o'clock tomorrow morning. Those strong storms could dump up to 2 inches of rain on the city causing some flash flooding. Officials say those in basements should be ready to move to higher ground. New Yorkers could see major changes to city elections under proposal floated by the Adams administration. Open primaries have every candidate run in the same primary, no matter their party affiliation. Jeff Coldon is a reporter with political New York. He says the top two vote getters would then face off in the general election.

So even if they were two Democrats who finished first and second, they would go on to the general rather than what we're used to, which is always a Democrat versus a Republican. Proponents say it opens primaries to independent voters. Those against it say it would be a free-for-all and would reduce the power of important interest groups like unions. City Hall wants to get the question on the ballot this November as part of the charter revision commission process. Once again, we're under a heat advisory until 8 o'clock tonight.

A flood watch begins at 2 o'clock this afternoon all the way till 2 o'clock tomorrow morning. We have a good chance of showers and thunderstorms this afternoon, a high near 92, but feeling much hotter than that. 92 and partly sunny right now. You're listening to All Things Considered here on WNYC. I'm Tiffany Hanson. New York City's beaches are open for this season. The city has been working to get more lifeguards on duty to protect swimmers in the ocean and at the city's pools. But maybe you don't want to have to wait on long lines at the pool or scurry for a spot in the sand at the city's most popular and crowded beaches. Well, that's where Staten Island comes in. WNYC's Parks and Sanitation reporter Liam Quigley talks with us about those beaches. Highly. Hey, how are you? Doing all right. Okay, so give us a lay of the land, or should I say sand on Staten Island? Look, the Rockways have 11 miles of beachfront, and there's a reason that so many people go there. There was one day where last summer, over 100,000 people went out on a single day. But if you want to get away from that, Staten Island has 14 miles of beaches.

Not all of them have lifeguards, but they offer something really different from the Rockways. You've got South Beach, Midland Beach. These are kind of the popular ones closer to the Verrazano Bridge. You've got Cedar Grove Beach. You've got Great Kills, which is a federally run beach, Wolf's Pond Park, all the way down towards the conference house. So it's like it's 14 miles of really different types of beaches that Staten Island offers. Well, you mentioned the Verrazano Bridge here. So let's talk about how we get to these beaches. There is really no direct link like from the subway or the ferry. Is that right? that's the challenge with all these beaches. It's like, yeah, you do need to have a car or a bicycle, a motorcycle, whatever, or take the Staten Island Railroad and got on a bus or walk kind of far. So that's like the hurdle to overcome here. And it's definitely going to be a big chunk of your day. At the same time, that's kind of the appeal. Like you're on an adventure. You're really on a mission to check out one of these beaches. Well, you're also on an adventure from the standpoint of like some of these beaches.

can get kind of wild, right? So tell us about some of these, you know, a little more, less groomed beaches, should we say. Yeah, definitely. Like, nature is definitely running things a lot more at these beaches, starting at like the southern tip of the island where as you're walking down towards the water, there's wild turkeys kind of checking you out at Great Kills Park. There's deer running across the road. At Wolves Pawn Park in that area, you'll see horseshoe crabs on the beach. So yeah, nature is definitely like the presence of nature is more felt. Let's talk a little bit about water quality at these beaches, because I do think about that when I met other city beaches. So is the water clean off Staten Island? Is it okay for swimming? You mentioned it's okay for wildlife. Does that mean it's okay for us?

You can absolutely swim when there are life cards on duty and when there is no advisory for swimming. The water quality can suffer off Staten Island beaches because of the geography and because of stormwater runoff. So you should check before you go. But certainly, they're perfectly fine beaches to swim at when there's no advisory. But I kind of think of them not the same way as Rockways. Like, Rockways, that's a, I'm there to swim a lot. Like, that's the main appeal. But Staten Island beaches have other things to offer.

Do you have a favorite of the Staten Island beaches? Cedar Grove beaches, really nice. There was one day in terms of attendance where, like, only 145 people visited that beach, but there's still lifeguards. The sand is clean. The water's relatively clean for Staten Island. It's a really nice kind of secluded area to check out. That's WNYC's Parks and Sanitation Reporter Liam Quigley.

Liam, thanks so much for joining us. Thank you. Thanks for listening. This is NYC now from WMYC. Catch us every weekday, three times a day, for your top news headlines and occasional deep dives. And subscribe wherever you get your podcast. More soon.