Monday, April 7, 2014

New York's response to the hurricane

Hello readers, this is a response to an in-class assignment about my opinion on if New York's response to the hurricane was adequate or inadequate for my English 101 class. I strongly believe New York did a very good job responding to the hurricane in some ways, they warned everyone about it and evacuated people who are in danger out of the area and put them into a safe place until the hurricane was over and they could go back home.New York also did not allow private companies to rebuild everything the way they wanted it to be so they can make a profit from it, in the reading "Blanking the Beach" Klein writes about privatization of sri Lanka after the tsunami(79). which means that they allowed private companies to rebuild after a disaster damaged the area, but the bad thing about this is that they are allowing them to make a profit from the disaster, and that's just sick and disgusting, how can someone with money just come along and attempt to make a profit off of other peoples suffering like this. This is why i'm glad that they did not come in and and build after the damage that hurricane sandy has caused. On the other hand New York failed to help people after the damage was done, many people where left homeless because their homes where destroyed, and the government did not help them rebuild or relocate them to a nearby hotel and pay for it until they can come back home, but they didn't. New York did not do this at all, leaving people to do everything themselves, this is why we need to tax the rich more, if we did we would have enough money to help everyone suffering from this disaster, it's almost like New York shows favoritism towards the rich and does not care about anyone else.

Tuesday, April 1, 2014

the sandy aftermath

Hello readers, in this blog i will share my thoughts on two stories from the website http://www.sandystoryline.com/ for my English101 class. On this website there's a particular story that caught my attention is "Stuck in the system"  which is a clip of a man named John Watson sharing his story of the sandy aftermath. He begins by talking about the condition sandy left his apartment in that was so hazardous that it was considered unlivable. As Watson is talking with the interviewer he is waiting to be picked up to go back to his apartment after months of struggle to get the NYCHA to come in and fix the damage and move them into hotels until they finish. What shocked me most about this story is that the NYCHA "was still accepting our rent, knowing that we have been displaced here" (Watson) how can they still charge rent for apartments that are uninhabitable? and even when Watson arrived at his home the apartment still had mold and damage from the flood, almost as if they did nothing to the apartment. I remember back when i used to live in housing, it was very difficult to get them to come check out your apartment and do repairs, they just don't care about the people or their living conditions.

Another story on the website that was interesting was "Rebuilding a small business" that tells a story of a man named Phil Cicia who owns four shops around rockaway beach blvd he has lost his only source of income, and since his insurace does not cover flood damage, he is going to have to pay out of pocket for everything. And he can't get back on his feet because the companies refuse to supply Phil with stock to sell until he replaces the goods that where damaged by the floods due to hurricane sandy. It seems like FEMA and his insurance aren't taking this situation very seriously, This is his only income and without it, he will end up unemployed and have no money to feed himself or his family, which also includes his four employees that he has to pay.And since the hurricane forced people to leave the area, business is very slow making it very hard for him to make money. This is just an example of what could happen if flooding caused by Global warming discussed in the book "The Climate Casino" by William Nordhaus but at a small scale, imagine if the world had this issue? how many people will end up homeless? and will the government even help or care about the people who are affected by this? what will the government to help with this situation? if the sea levels rise just as William nordhaus predicted it to be, we can see this happening at catastrophic levels.