Emergencies and Disasters

How to salvage the $50 billion lost to water-related disasters every year? How to maintain disaster-prone areas like cyclone-exposed coastlines, where the human population has skyrocketed 192 per cent over the last 30 years? How to protect impoverished peoples who get hit the hardest, like the 783 million living without clean drinking water, or the millions along the Niger River sacked by flooding?

Superstorm Sandy left New York City scrambling to provide relief for the many people affected by the hurricane, which swept through in the late autumn of 2012. Fifty-five people were killed, and flooding damaged many homes and businesses. As with other disasters, responsibility for response to the tragedy fell to the hands of frontline public service workers. On Thursday 7 March 2013, workers from across the city came together to reflect on their professional experiences and to chart a common course moving forward in terms of disaster preparedness, response and recovery.

As the 29th World Congress of Public Services International drew to a close in Durban, South Africa, delegates celebrated that they had elected a woman to lead their global union federation for the first time in its 105 year history. PSI’s new General Secretary Rosa Pavanelli said, “I’m proud and honoured to carry the fight for social justice forward for PSI, our members and our communities.

Madelyn Brown is an paramedic in New York. Like her other AFSCME sisters and brothers working to help people during the disaster, she did extraordinary work on the job when hurricane Sandy hit New York.