Dear Friends and Colleagues:
It has been a long couple of weeks and our challenges are not over, but the efforts of everyone to ensure the health and safety of the individuals in our care during these difficult times deserve recognition.
While you might not think of yourselves as heroes, the stories I have heard and the staff I have met with since the storm tell me otherwise. One example jumps out at me, and I would like to share it with you. Omar Hunter and Bobby Mcrae work in the transportation department at Bernard M. Fineson in Queens. At the height of the storm on Monday night, October 29, they learned that several people were stranded in a home in Brooklyn.
Without hesitation, they got into a bus and headed into the storm. The two calmly told me how they were forced back on street after street by either rising waters or fallen trees.
When they arrived at the house, it was dark and surrounded by water. They ran to the front door and pounded on the door and windows. When no one answered, they waded through water to the back of the house where the bedrooms were located, and pounded and yelled until they got a response.
Omar and Bobby rescued 28 people that night, many in wheelchairs. They also got the home’s van running, and saved it, as well. Theirs is just one story of what makes all of you our everyday heroes. In the words of one director: “This experience taught us how we can pull together as one big OPWDD family.”
The lessons learned during Irene and Lee helped us form a solid plan that we enacted in the days before Sandy hit. While we could not anticipate the extent of the damage this storm would bring, we were prepared. Emergency plans that were laid out in the wake of last year’s storms were put into action, and everyone was ready to do his or her part.
Today, bridges and tunnels in and out of Manhattan are open and subway and bus services are slowly returning to normal, but many challenges remain. As Governor Andrew Cuomo coordinates the response among the federal, state, and local governments to rebuild what he has promised will be a better New York, I know that the people in our care are safe because you are there for them. Thank you.
Sincerely,
Commissioner Burke