{"id":9323,"date":"2013-07-02T08:23:42","date_gmt":"2013-07-02T12:23:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/?p=9323"},"modified":"2013-07-03T11:38:20","modified_gmt":"2013-07-03T15:38:20","slug":"cuomo-extreme-weather-and-climate-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/2013\/07\/02\/cuomo-extreme-weather-and-climate-change\/","title":{"rendered":"Cuomo, extreme weather and climate change"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Governor<\/a>

Governor Andrew Cuomo spoke about storm damage during a visit to Keene Saturday afternoon. Photo: Brian Mann<\/p><\/div>\n

The National Weather Service says it was a historically wet month in June, with rain totals measured in Massena coming in at a soggy 7.72 inches.\u00a0 That’s nearly an inch and a half above the last record set a decade ago.\u00a0 That’s a lot of water.<\/p>\n

Flash flood watches remain in effect, with more storms and heavy rain likely today.<\/p>\n

During his visit to Keene over the weekend, Governor Andrew Cuomo talked about New York’s recent spate of “extreme” weather and the need to build new and better infrastructure to deal with the problem.<\/p>\n

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I believe one of the new challenges for the state is extreme weather, call it what you want.\u00a0 Climate change tends to be a politicized topic, but I know one thing for sure.\u00a0 We have more extreme weather than we’ve ever seen before.\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n

We know the ocean is warming, we know that’s creating turbulent weather, and we know first-hand that we’ve been feeling it here in New York state.\u00a0 Hurricane Sandy, Irene, Lee, it just goes on and on.\u00a0 It seems like it’s a never-ending continuum of extreme weather.\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n

It’s something we have to take seriously, something we have to prepare for, on the state side we’re learning, we’ve investing in emergency management services.\u00a0 And we’re also working to make the kind of infrastructure improvements we have to make, culverts, storm drainage.\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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Because it is going to happen again, I believe that.\u00a0 And rather than be surprised every time and have people say ‘This is a one in a hundred year flood,’ a one in a hundred year flood happens every three years now.\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n

So let’s make the kinds of changes we have to make.\u00a0 Let’s make the kinds of improvements, so when the storm does hit it does less damage.<\/em><\/p>\n