Looking Back at Hurricane Sandy
By Henry Street Settlement
One year ago today, Hurricane Sandy slammed New York, flooding the much of the Lower East Side and plunging the entire neighborhood into darkness that lasted a week. Though not the hardest hit area in the region, the storm had a devastating impact on local residents; many have a precarious existence, living below the poverty line and paycheck to paycheck.
Henry Street was there from the beginning. In the days after the storm, we worked in unheated and unlit offices to ensure that our clinic patients received their medication. Our Meals on Wheels drivers climbed dozens of flights of stairs in darkened stairwells to deliver meals and flashlights to trapped residents. At our headquarters and in our senior services kitchen, we turned out hundreds of hot meals that we distributed in adjacent public housing courtyards to residents without power.
That the Settlement was the point agency for the Lower East Side became quickly apparent when an 18-wheel truck pulled up in front of Henry Street three days after the storm. Inside were 19,000 FEMA meals, which the agency – with the help of volunteers — distributed to other community based organizations and the hungry residents of the neighborhood. Henry Street also distributed thousands of blankets, water bottles, flashlights and other items brought to our front door by the National Guard.
Our Urban Family Shelter was especially hard-hit. The building was flooded, the boiler (and so many supplies) ruined and most difficult of all was the human toll: our 108 families were evacuated to city evacuation shelters, a move that disrupted their road from shelter and to self-sufficiency.There was other damage to Settlement programs. The most poignant may be the destruction of our brand new basketball floor at the Boys & Girls Republic, on East Sixth Street and Avenue D. The new, eagerly awaited floor was but one month old when Sandy hit. After additional money was raised, a second new floor was installed in June of 2013.
“The crisis that was Hurricane Sandy reinforced the value and effectiveness of the settlement model,” said David Garza, Executive Director of Henry Street. “The trust, knowledge, proximity, infrastructure and “street smarts” of community organizations were all called into play. We were grateful to be able to serve our community when they needed us most.” Garza added that the teamwork and dedication of Henry Street staff was never more in evidence than during the storm and its aftermath.
One initiative that emerged from the storm was Project Hope, a grant-funded program that provides crisis counseling, educational information and resource linkage to those affected by Sandy. The Project Hope team at Henry Street has reached out to more than 54,000 New Yorkers since it began in December.
Like all New Yorkers, we are hoping for a quiet hurricane season, but ready to spring into action if a storm strikes.
