Among many New York neighborhoods hit by the super storm, Hurricane Sandy, the Rockaways in Queens are suffering.
While many are in turmoil over the gas shortage, citizens in the Rockaway neighborhood are on a shortage of food. According to the Huffington Post:
The nearest hot meal was more than a mile away, past the smoldering ruins, at an intersection where Ajay Singh and three other Sikh men from Queens had come of their own initiative to dole out steaming bowls of rice and beans and toasted bread made in their church kitchen.
Melissa Lopez, who was awaiting her phone to be charged at the location, says:
“We have no electricity, no water and some of us don’t have enough food,”
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She continues:
“When are we going to get help?”
Laura O’Connor, who lives on Beach 93rd Street tells the site:
“We’re being ignored down here. Where can our people get food?”
Huffington Post reports:
Authorities here are dealing with many challenges at once — restoring power, maintaining public safety, plowing sand out of the roads and removing downed trees, to name a few. And there are some signs of improvement. Water distribution is better, residents say, and on Friday afternoon, the National Guard began distributing Meals Ready to Eat at three locations in the Rockaways.
However the response of the people in the neiborhood say the response has not been quick enough.
Phillip Goldfelder who represents the district that includes the Rockaways in the New York State Assembly, says:
“I get that it is tough to coordinate the cleanup, but it is not tough to coordinate bringing in food,” he said. “We are not asking for anything complicated. We are begging for food, begging for blankets.”
The past days in New York have been overwhelmingly tough sincy Sandy, but we’re hoping recovery can improve and everyone reaches out to help one another in these tragic times.
SOURCE: Huffington Post
