Comptroller Lander’s Letter to Mayor Adams on New York City’s Hurricane Preparedness

The Honorable Eric Adams
Mayor
City Hall New York, NY 10007

Re: Preparedness Indicators

Dear Mayor Adams,

Storms, heavy rains, and intense hurricanes are becoming more frequent and severe with climate change. This June, Hurricane Beryl was the earliest category 5 storm on record. This hurricane season is expected to abnormally active and bring even more coastal floods and heavy rains to our City.

As you know well, City government has a crucial role to play in managing emergency response to severe storms and flooding, from communicating emergency alerts to cleaning catch basins to building more resilient infrastructure. It is critical that we pay sharp attention to these issues to ensure our city is as prepared as we can be for climate emergencies.

Ten years after Hurricane Sandy, my office found a significant portion of federal recovery funds had yet to be spent and put forward recommendations to more effectively build critical flood protection infrastructure and strengthen social resilience for our communities. My office’s investigation of the City’s emergency response to flash flooding revealed several gaps in storm preparedness.

As the City gears up for what’s expected to be an active hurricane season, my office will be monitoring key preparedness indicators through November 2024 to assess the City’s ongoing readiness for severe storms. Our goal is to provide transparency to help ensure that New Yorkers are kept safe in the face of climate threats and disasters.

Pursuant to the Comptroller’s authority under Section 93 of the New York City Charter, the Comptroller’s Office respectfully asks for responses and backup documentation in response to the following questions and requests for information. For each item below, please provide the requested information each month by filling values for the preceding month into the attached template spreadsheet. Please specify in the “notes” column whether values are daily averages over the month, monthly totals, or rates as of the end of the month.

1. NotifyNYC enrollment
   1. What is the City’s goal or target for the number of individuals enrolled to receive NotifyNYC emergency weather alerts
   2. How many individuals are currently enrolled to receive emergency weather alerts?
2. Basement emergency notification list enrollment
   1. Please provide instructions for how people can enroll in the basement emergency notification list.
   2. What is the City’s goal or target for the number of individuals enrolled in the basement emergency notification list?
   3. How many individuals are currently enrolled in the basement emergency notification list?
3. Catch basin cleaning
   1. How many specialized catch basin cleaning trucks were available for service? What was the availability rate of the catch basin cleaning trucks?
   2. How many full catch basin full replacements were completed in the previous month?
   3. How many catch basins hardware replacements have been completed in the past month?
4. Coastal flood protection
   1. How much has the City spent by program of the HUD Community Development Block Grant – Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR) funds? (Please note spending by program on the detail sheet.)
   2. How much has the City spent by agency of the FEMA-PA funds? (Please specify spending on an agency-by-agency basis on the data sheet.)
   3. How many staff positions does the DEP Bureau of Coastal Resiliency have? For each position, please include job titles and responsibilities.
5. Property buy-outs in flood-prone areas
   1. What is the total number of properties acquired to date through buy-out programs to acquire properties at risk of inland flooding?
   2. What is the total number of households to date that have been provided counseling services to help them prepare to move from properties at risk of flooding through buy-out programs?

Attached is a template data form that you can use to provide the above information on a monthly basis through November 30, 2024. We request the data by the 15th day of each month for data for the previous month. To coordinate across agencies engaged in preparedness, we request that NYC Chief Climate Officer Rohit Aggarwala serve as the primary point of contact to send the monthly data to Louise Yeung, Chief Climate Officer for the Office of the NYC Comptroller, at lyeung@comptroller.nyc.gov.

Thank you very much for your attention to this request, and for your ongoing leadership and public service to make New York City more prepared for climate emergencies.

Sincerely,
Brad Lander
New York City Comptroller

Cc: Rohit Aggarwala, NYC Chief Climate Officer