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It’s hard to believe it’s been 13 years since Superstorm Sandy—once a Category 3 hurricane with 115 miles per hour winds—slammed into Long Island as a Category 1 hurricane with 80 miles per hour winds, leaving in its aftermath billions of dollars of devastating damages.
While hurricane damages are often caused by wind and rain, Sandy’s wrath was that, along with up to eight inches of rain it dropped across some areas of Long Island. A storm surge of up to 12.65 feet above normal tide level damaged or destroyed nearly 100,000 homes, with more than 2,000 no longer inhabitable. Fire Island was underwater, and the South Shore of Long Island from Long Beach to Montauk had to withstand the coastal damage that the storm surge brought.
While the “once in 100-year storm” came and went, the region is still processing how to prevent another financial fiasco should another “superstorm” make landfall on Long Island. LiRo-Hill GIS services just-issued report illustrates the economic consequences if we don’t.
LiRo found that in the Federal Emergency Management Agency designated Long Island flood zones, 34,178 of Long Island’s nearly 100,000 businesses could risk significant economic loss from flooding should another significant storm hit the region. Of the 34,178 businesses, 7,360 were considered very high risk or high risk, generating $8.6 billion in revenues and employing 81,652 employees. While another 26,818 businesses were considered medium risk, they can’t be disregarded because they do employ 200,272 Long Islanders and generate $32.6 billion in revenues.
These risks can’t be overlooked since the total revenue of $41.2 billion in revenue are approximately 17% of Long Island’s Gross Regional Product. A very significant economic consideration. As are the 281,924 potentially impacted employees which account for 20.6% of the 1.365 million Long Island jobs. With the per capita income in Suffolk County of $88,816 and Nassau County of $104,873, the lost economic impact from lost wages would average approximately $27 billion. While these are worst-case scenarios, the financial impact of the risk to Long Island can’t be discounted either. That risk wasn’t overlooked by New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, as noted in his recent report on Severe Weather Events and Resiliency in New York State.
Citing data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, DiNapoli found that Suffolk County experienced the highest number of severe weather events between 1996 and 2024 of all New York counties with 1,751. Nassau County was 22nd with 899. Additionally, between 1978 and 2024, Suffolk County was named in 36 disaster and emergency declarations while Nassau County was named 31 times, making Suffolk County and Nassau County the 3rd and 7th most impacted counties, respectively, in New York State. As for payouts from the National Flood Insurance Program, between 1978 and 2024, Nassau County and Suffolk County were first and second, respectively, in New York State. While Suffolk County, is geographically larger than Nassau County, the latter is more densely populated which explains why Nassau had nearly $2.3 billion in flood damage claims followed by Suffolk with $1.1 billion.
Now is the time to implement flood damage preventing infrastructure. Considering that Suffolk has 980 or 37.3% of New York State coastline miles, with Nassau having another 60 miles, gambling against another storm or severe weather event and its financial risks, and human impact, seems unwise.
Martin Cantor is director of the Long Island Center for Socio-Economic Policy and former Suffolk County economic development commissioner. He can be reached at [email protected].
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