Repairs to a single section of damage at the Stony Brook Mill Pond may exceed $10 million, with funding expected to come from local, state, and federal sources.

The extensive damage, a grim episode in Long Island’s struggle against climate change, occurred during a torrential storm in August that devastated Suffolk County.

Flooding from the storm caused Harbor Road, which supports the Stony Brook Mill Pond, to collapse. The breach resulted in catastrophic consequences for the ecosystem and surrounding infrastructure. 

“Water rushed out of the 11-acre pond and across the breached road, causing debris to cascade down Stony Brook Creek and into the harbor,” the Ward Melville Heritage Organization (WMHO), responsible for preserving the area’s historic properties, reported on their website. “The collapse resulted in the pond completely draining, leaving behind a scene where all the wildlife—fish and turtles—had been washed away.” 

The destruction extended to Mill Creek Road, a nearby section owned by WMHO that borders the Stony Brook Grist Mill, a historic structure dating to 1751. The collapse left seven houses inaccessible as the road crumbled into Stony Brook Creek.

In the storm's immediate aftermath, officials estimated the damage at around $40 million—that figure has since climbed to $100 million. Following the storm, President Joe Biden approved a federal emergency declaration, granting Suffolk County access to Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) assistance for critical infrastructure repairs.

Construction on Mill Creek Road began on Wednesday, Nov. 20. 

The Stony Brook Mill Pond is listed on both the National and New York State Registers of Historic Places.

State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli claimed that the Metropolitan Transit Authority is in worse financial shape than previously reported.

Members of the New York Professional Nurses Union, which includes nurses at Lenox Hill Hospital, may strike if Northwell Health doesn’t agree to improve working conditions.

New York State Democrats maintained their majority but lost their supermajority in the Legislature, with one race still too close to call.  

Over the weekend, several brush fires broke out within and around NYC due to ongoing drought conditions.

Because implementing congestion pricing requires Federal approval, Governor Hochul would need to relaunch its implementation before Trump’s inauguration in just over two months. She is allegedly considering dropping the toll from $15 to $9 and has inquired with the US Department of Transportation about whether this change would require another round of environmental review.

As Long Islanders live through historic drought, unseasonably warm temperatures, and an unending broadcast of footage of nearby forest fires this autumn, climate change is undeniably manifesting in our own backyard.

In the past six weeks, Nassau and Suffolk Counties have gotten so little rain that the US Drought Monitor has classified the entire island as being in severe drought status. From dry skies putting strain on farms out east, islandwide firefighters responding to upwards of 200 brushfire calls, and a 75 degree Halloween, the changing climate presents urgent and overlapping local challenges. 

This comes on the heels of the hottest summer on global record. For Long Islanders, this summer brought not only back-to-back-to-back heatwaves but a catastrophic flood event that destroyed multiple homes and collapsed Stony Brook’s Mill Dam. 

Climate scientists warn that this is only the beginning—our summers will only get hotter, the floods stronger, the droughts longer. The New York State Climate Impacts Assessment reports that sea levels are projected to rise two to three feet along our own coastline by the end of the century, threatening to put our beaches and bayside communities underwater. One recent study identifies Long Island as the fourth most climate change-vulnerable population area in all of the US. 

Now is the time to wake up to the fact that we are living on a different Long Island than previous generations. That there were once days when ice skating across a frozen Great South Bay was a possible winter activity sounds like mythology to anyone born this century. 

This is not news—scientists have been sounding alarms to the public for over fifty years that these exact changes and disasters will result as a consequence of burning fossil fuels. Yet business as usual continues largely uninterrupted. It isn’t hard to figure out why politicians paid off by the fossil fuel lobby wish to maintain the status quo, but why do so many hardworking Long Islanders with everything to lose shrug our shoulders and accept it?  

Maybe because on some level, we think of climate change as a sad yet unavoidable news story that is happening far away to some invisible, unfortunate other. Or we know it will impact our own lives in dramatic ways, but convince ourselves it’s a tomorrow problem. No matter our rationale for behaving as if we aren’t living through a crisis that demands immediate and radical action, this rainless and flaming November forces us to admit that climate change is happening here, now, and to us. One well-circulated tweet in response to footage of a 2022 England fire reads, “Climate change will manifest as a series of disasters viewed through phones with footage that gets closer and closer to where you live until you’re the one filming it.” Now, on Long Island, we are the ones behind the camera. We are firsthand witnesses to the reality of a warming world, yet this election Long Islanders voted overwhelmingly red, for the party of climate denialism and blind fossil fuel industry support. But a blue tide on the island would not have rescued us either, as Democrats deliver only watered-down climate solutions while championing expansion of domestic fossil fuel production and prioritizing funding the nation’s polluting war machine.

But there is still time—optimistic climate experts give us five or so years to pull off an energy transition and prevent the worst projections from coming true. It is up to us to meet the moment and collectively fight hard for our home and each other. Many promising climate solutions are already unfolding islandwide: Suffolk County is actively building capacity for solar and offshore wind power. Governor Hochul this spring announced 17 downtown revitalization projects that will encourage energy-efficient building use and alternatives to driving. A new Coastal Restoration Coalition of islandwide environmental organizations announced this September will work to advance resilience of Long Island Sound coastlines, protecting communities from storm surge. Long Island DSA established an ecosocialist working group to bring people energized to tackle climate change together, connect the dots between exploitation of workers and exploitation of the planet, and chart an alternative path forward. Every place that experiences climate change is a frontier to fight it. Long Island is a frontier to fight it. And many Long Islanders are already fighting. More of us must join if we want to win.

Climate disasters are unique in the way that they lay bare every element of capitalist violence. As we watch the horrifying aftermath of the flooding caused by Hurricane Helene along Florida’s Gulf Coast, Tennessee, North Carolina, and surrounding states, and the destruction of Hurricane Milton’s wind, storm surge, and spun-off tornadoes, we’re reminded that the causes are human-made and that no disaster is truly “natural.” 

The aftermath of disasters is also a time when goodwill thrives among neighbors; people who have lost everything show each other kindness and solidarity that can drive our entire social system. We see it now, watching our comrades who live outside the worst damage of Helene and Milton opening their homes to displaced comrades, filling box trucks with drinking water and baby formula, prepping crews to enter after the all-clear, and helping comrades and neighbors alike muck and gut their houses to prepare to rebuild.  This solidarity at the grassroots can and must be matched by organized political power—and where socialists have organized and fought, we have turned this solidarity into real action! 

Socialist politicians have been at the forefront of demanding more public funds to improve infrastructure against severe storm damage, building support networks to give people more opportunities to evacuate without fear or financial constraint, and fighting for a just transition to lessen our dependence on fossil fuels and slow the warming of the earth. As we continue to build that necessary infrastructure and fight for socialism everywhere, we call on DSA members and allies to join us in supporting the working class on the ground in the disaster zones.    

Donate funds! DSA chapters outside the disaster zone—NC Triangle DSA and Miami DSA—have set up relief funds, and are working primarily with chapters within the affected areas and mutual aid coalition partners to help fulfill basic needs for people affected by the disaster. We encourage DSA chapters across the country to think about hosting a fundraiser and splitting the proceeds between these two relief funds.  NC Triangle/Asheville DSA Relief Fund Miami/Gulf Coast FL DSA Relief Fund.  

Demand more! As western North Carolina locals attempt to put their lives and communities back together, rent is still due, and many landlords will not hesitate to evict tenants simply for being victims of a disaster. The working-class people at risk of being evicted are the same people who make this region flourish and who will be essential to rebuilding and making western North Carolina run in the future. Asheville DSA and North Carolina tenant organizers are demanding an indefinite moratorium on all evictions for all affected NC counties. If you’re a North Carolina resident, sign on now to tell NC Governor Roy Cooper and NC county commissioners that it’s the state’s job to ensure safe housing in this ongoing disaster, and stable housing is a human right beyond this crisis!  

Donate time! North Carolina chapters have already begun the process of scouting homes that need “mucking and gutting” (drywall removal and debris/furniture/goods clean-out), a process that must be completed as quickly as possible in order to mitigate black mold and foundation problems, but which will realistically be ongoing for several months. We anticipate further direction from Florida chapters soon. If you are within a day’s drive of these areas, we encourage you to put together a team who can make a road trip for a few days and help with this work—experience is not necessary and training is available, but it may also be a good opportunity to connect with labor unions (especially building trades) in your area to put a crew together that includes both skilled labor and enthusiastic brute force. If your DSA chapter is interested in this, please fill out this form, hosted by NC Triangle DSA.  

Organize locally! Coordinate with your local DSA elected officials, if you have them, as well as dedicated disaster relief groups, environmental groups, and labor and tenant unions, to figure out how you can organize for a just transition in your area to mitigate likely climate and industrial disaster after-effects and to harden your infrastructure. Browse organizing resources from DSA’s Green New Deal Campaign Committee and reach out to the GNDCC for more information about ways your chapter can take on a Building For Power campaign of your own."

• Please take a moment to repost and share our mutual aid fund social media posts on Twitter and Instagram which you can find here and here

• And, lastly, could y’all spread our donation fund link and request for folks to join the chat in your internal communications? You can find a direct link to the fund here.

Exit Right
Gabriel Winant, Dissent

Trump has remade Americans, and to defeat Trumpism requires nothing less than the left doing the same.

“Resistance Through a Realist Lens”
Abdaljawad Omar and Arielle Angel, Jewish Currents

Palestinian writer Abdaljawad Omar discusses the left’s relationship to Hamas and armed resistance.

Questions of Funding
Ruairí Casey, London Review of Books

In Germany today, state funding of the arts, academia and civil society has become a crucial tool to shape compliance with the state’s unwavering support for Israel’s wars on Gaza and Lebanon.

Aspects of Evil: A Conversation with Alberto Toscano
Alberto Toscano, Edwin Nasr and Lama El Khatib, Makhzin

A key term we continuously come across in relation to Zionist colonial fascism and its ongoing genocidal campaign against Palestinian life in Gaza is that of “evil” — a term we hold both an affective attachment and theoretical ambivalence towards.

The Antisemitism of Zionism
Shane Burley, Spectre

If we examine the lineage that created Zionism and fought for Israel’s formation in 1948, antisemitism is not merely its justification—it is sometimes the logic that Zionism produced itself.

A Glass of Water, a Burning Boy: Fady Joudah on Images From Gaza
Fady Joudah, Literary Hub

“Is the language of his killers not part of our life? Is there a death we have not cheapened?”

‘I Couldn’t Cry Over My Children Like Everyone Else’: The Tragedy of Palestinian Journalist Wael al-Dahdouh
Nesrine Malik, The Guardian

After his wife and two of his children were killed in Gaza, Al Jazeera journalist Wael al-Dahdouh became famous around the world for his decision to keep reporting. But this was just the start of his heartbreaking journey.

The Limits of Witness
Mary Turfah, Bookforum

What a surgeon’s 1989 memoir tells us about working in Gaza and Lebanon.

An Alternative Economy Takes Root in the West Bank
Nadine Fattaleh and Andrew Ross, Hammer & Hope

By returning to the land, Palestinians find new ways to resist.

Liberal Values
Ahdaf Soueif, London Review of Books

There comes a moment when people realize that all these manifestations of ‘liberal values’ are cover for what is happening on the ground.

Whether you were able to attend our kickoff event, our first discussion, or not, you're still very much welcome to join us for our remaining Reading Group discussions of Karl Marx's Capital. Whether you're attending as an individual or tackling it as a chapter activity, we encourage all DSA members to get tuned in and learn more about this pivotal work in the Marxist canon. Here are our next discussion dates:

Dec. 17th: Discussion II: Parts III & IV

Jan 21st: Discussion III: Parts V, VI, VII

Feb 25th: Discussion IV: THE END. 

If you would like to join us as we discuss Capital.

2. Long Island entered a severe __ in November after weeks without rain.

5. Received tens of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from organizations like the Pro-Israel America PAC.

6. Long Island saw about 75℉ this __ .

7. Passed with a 62% majority, amending the NY state constitution to protect abortion rights.

11. Closest thing we’ve ever gotten to a legitimate American revolutionary vanguard.

13. Loathed by environmental advocacy groups, his consistent anti-environment voting records earned him the Environmental Advocates’ Oil Sick Award in 2011.

14. The __ Group, the world’s largest private equity firm that has spearheaded the deforestation of the Amazon and innumerable other controversies.

15. Within days of his nomination as administrator of the __ , an old campaign contributor to [5-ACROSS], [14-ACROSS], invested $500 million into new AI data centers.

16. On 1 November 1963, a rent strike by mostly Black tenants living in slum conditions in __ began. By mid-December, the protest had grown to include Puerto Rican residents and had spread to 58 buildings housing 850 families in the area. The rent strike resulted in rents lowered from $100 to $1 for some and other improvements to living conditions.

1. About 200 were reported at the peak of [2-ACROSS]. Many along the side of the L.I.E.

3. Under [12-DOWN],  __ has pledged humane treatment and reception for the immigrants a resurgent Trump is poised to pogrom from the U.S. 

4. Has met with Oath Keepers, voted against investigating the Jan. 6 coup, and spent the last year as part of Linda McMahon’s America First Policy Institute. 

8. Flooding from an August storm caused Harbor Road, which supported the __ , to collapse. The breach resulted in catastrophic consequences for the ecosystem and surrounding infrastructure.

9. Just released NLRB data show a large increase in US union elections and wins, as a three-year __ movement surge continues.

10. “The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born: now is the time of monsters.” -  __

11. CEOs of major corporations make almost __ times more than their average employees, while weekly wages have remained stagnant over the last 50 years and 60 percent of Americans live paycheck to paycheck.

12. The closest thing NAFTA has to a leader on the side of the people. Her administration has recognized Palestine and supported calls for Palestinian sovereignty and prosecution of Israel’s genocidal leadership.