Meng Leads Letter to Mayor Adams Urging City to Consider Purchasing Queens Homes At Risk of Flooding During Storms

QUEENS, NY – Following the one-year anniversary of Hurricane Ida devastating Queens, and local floods occurring again last week, U.S. Rep. Grace Meng (D-Queens) today led a letter to Mayor Adams urging him to consider implementing a voluntary buyout program for homes in the borough that are at risk of severe flooding during storms.

The correspondence, signed by several other Queens elected officials, encourages the mayor to use the $187 million in federal Ida relief money that New York City received from the Community Development Block Grant Disaster Recovery Funding (CDBG-DR). The money was included in the Disaster Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act, a bill that Meng helped pass in Congress last year. The City is presently finalizing a plan for using the funds which can go toward purchasing local homes.

"In Queens, lives were turned upside down by the unprecedented flooding that the remnants of Hurricane Ida caused last year, and constituents continue to pick up the pieces from the damage they sustained," said Meng. "And many who were impacted by Ida were also affected by last week's flooding, forcing them to endure additional setbacks. In order to address this issue in our borough, we must use every tool that is at our disposal, and implementing a voluntary buyout program, in conjunction with my call to upgrade our sewers and catch basins with money from the federal infrastructure bill, would go a long way toward helping to combat the problem, and improve the safety and well-being of our communities. We must act to help save lives and prevent future property damage."

According to the CDBG-DR, funds may be used for designing and implementing a buyout program in which the city could purchase properties in a target area with the intent to demolish the structures to create park amenities, open space, or flood storage/overflow areas.

The letter is signed by Queens Borough President Donovan Richards; Queens State Senators John Liu, Toby Stavisky and Leroy Comrie; Queens Assemblymembers Andrew Hevesi, Catalina Cruz and Nily Rozic; and QueensCouncilmembers Linda Lee, Bob Holden, Sandra Ung and Lynn Schulman. It can be viewed here, and the text is below.

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September 20, 2022

The Honorable Eric Adams

Mayor of New York City

City Hall

New York, NY 10007

Dear Mayor Adams,

As you finalize the City of New York's Action Plan for deploying the $187 million in Community Development Block Grant Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR) funds that Congress appropriated in the Disaster Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2022, H.R. 5305, we urge you to consider implementing a voluntary buyout program for homes vulnerable to hazardous flooding in Queens.

Last year, Queens tragically lost 11 community members to Hurricane Ida. Countless others were left without a home, car, and possessions, costing millions of dollars in damages. And on September 13, just days after marking the one-year anniversary of this tragedy, many of these same residents were rudely awoken to water rushing into their homes. This most recent storm dropped roughly 2 inches of rain over the course of several hours, far less than the 3 inches Ida dropped in a single hour. Sadly, many of these homes were flooded just the same.

According to New York City's 2018 Stormwater Flood Maps, many of these homes are vulnerable to inland flooding. An unfortunate example of this is Peck Avenue, Flushing, where homes sit on a dredged lakebed. Just between Peck Avenue and 56Avenue in Queens, three residents died due to Ida flooding, and once again, this area experienced extreme flooding from the September 13 rainfall. It is unacceptable for these residents and others to live under the imminent threat of flooding year after year. That is why we urge you to use the federal CDBG-DR funding to implement a voluntary buyout program to give homeowners a fair market price for their homes so they may relocate.

According to the CDBG-DR, grantees may use funds for designing and implementing a buyout program in which the city could purchase properties in a target area with the intent to demolish the structures to create park amenities, open space, or flood storage/overflow areas. Implementing this program, in conjunction with the city's work to improve stormwater infrastructure throughout Queens, is paramount to the safety and well-being of our communities.

The $187 million was provided through the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's CDBG-DR for the purpose of funding long-term recovery efforts following Hurricane Ida. Given the impacts of Ida on Queens as well as the September 13flooding, your consideration of a home buyout program is critical. We look forward to your response on this matter.

Sincerely,