Group of Yonkers teens aims to provide green solutions to flooding concerns after Ida

The work of a Yonkers environmental group made up of teens is more urgent than ever in the wake of Ida.

News 12 Staff

Sep 16, 2021, 9:44 PM

Updated 1,124 days ago

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The work of a Yonkers environmental group made up of teens is more urgent than ever in the wake of Ida.
After a municipal housing authority complex in southwest Yonkers saw waters rise 7 feet during Ida, Groundwork Hudson Valley is aiming to provide a green solution.
Groundworks executive director Brigitte Griswold runs the Green Team, a program that employs Yonkers teens to do environmental work. Their next project is to construct a bioswale at the complex.
Griswold says the bioswale will help “direct flood water away from where you don’t want it to go— i.e., into the basements of the apartments— and where you do want it to go, into the ground."
Video taken after Ida shows unprecedented flooding along the Saw Mill River Parkway. Weeks before, News 12 documented the Green Team’s flood mitigation efforts at the same location where they planted trees.
The trees survived the storm, which gave the teens hope that they can do something about climate change.
The Green Team is using maps created by the New Schools Urban Systems lab that identifies flood prone areas across Yonkers, which happen to align with historically redlined neighborhoods.
"We need to be aware what communities are being disproportionately affected by year-round flood risk,” says Pablo Herreros Cantis, a research fellow at Urban Systems Lab.
Bank of America has donated half a million dollars, and the Municipal Housing Authority for Yonkers is providing $1 million in funding to support the Green Team’s work.