Good Wednesday morning.
The late 60s through the 70s marked an awakening in this country around the alarming disregard we had collectively adopted when it came to the health of the planet.
Let us consider, for a moment, the infamous Love Canal environmental disaster in Niagara Falls.
If, for some reason you’re not familiar with this horror story, in short it went like this: An entire neighborhood discovered they had been living on a leaking toxic chemical dump, compliments of The Hooker Chemical Company, which – with the government’s permission – dumped more than 21,000 tons of toxic waste into an abandoned canal and then later sold the 16-acre site to the local board of education for $1.
Side note: When someone wants to sell you property for $1 you should probably a little suspicious about what’s lurking under the soil. Oh, and by the way, there WAS, in fact, a warning in the property deed, but somehow no one worried about that at the time.
The unsuspecting community went on to build an elementary school and more than 800 homes and 240 low-income apartments on and around this toxic dump site.
It wasn’t until the late 1970s that heavy rain caused the chemicals to start leeching into basements and backyards, causing significant health problems among residents. People started reporting a rash of inexplicable illnesses – from migraines and epilepsy to miscarriages and birth defects.
This led over time – thanks to the tireless efforts of local activists, led by a local mom named Lois Gibbs, and their supporters – to mass evacuations, a federal emergency declaration by then-President Jimmy Carter, and the creation in 1980 of the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act – AKA the Superfund Act.
The EPA removed Love Canal from the Superfund site list in 2004, marking the end of a years-long $400 million cleanup effort. The site has been deemed safe for residential habitation in some locations, though it remains under regular monitoring and some locals still report fears and problems.
Love Canal’s legacy lives on in the grassroots environmental justice movement, whose members continue to battle on a wide range of fronts around development, clean air and water, energy and more.
Six years before the story of Love Canal started seeping (probably a bad choice of words, sorry) into the national consciousness, the first Earth Day was celebrated, as 20 million Americans took to the streets, parks, college campuses to express their concerns about the degradation of the environment.
Wisconsin Sen. Gaylord Nelson and activist Denis Hayes organized this environmental teach-in, inspired by the anti-war effort that had galvanized student protest to the Vietnam War. April 22 was chosen specifically to maximize college student participation because it fell between Spring Break and final exams.
Today – 56 years later – Earth Day is an international effort, with more than 1 billion people in 192 countries around the globe observing.
It’s not a bad day for Earth Day celebrations, weather-wise, especially if you’re planning on planting a tree or two. It will be cloudy with the slight chance of a rain shower – good for the plants! – and high temperatures will flirt with 60 degrees.
In the headlines…
President Trump said he would extend the U.S. ceasefire with Iran until Tehran provides a unified proposal, but added that the U.S. military blockade of the Strait of Hormuz would remain in place.
The United States and Iran are facing an uneasy stalemate today after peace talks between the countries were postponed and Iranian and American military forces sought to exert control over shipping near the Strait of Hormuz.
Virginia voters have approved a Democrat-backed redistricting plan, greenlighting a new congressional map that could net the party as many as four seats ahead of the midterm elections.
With 97% of the vote in, the “yes” vote on the ballot referendum held a narrow lead of 3 percentage points.
National party leaders had been heavily invested in the outcome, with Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the minority leader, helping orchestrate the statewide Virginia referendum with Democratic state legislators.
Democrats have now won statewide votes in California and Virginia to redraw congressional maps as part of a mid-decade redistricting arms race that began last year when President Trump urged GOP-led states to alter their district lines.
Markwayne Mullin, the homeland security secretary, said yesterday that his department would run out of money to pay employees the first week of May if Congress failed to reach a deal to reopen the department.
“The money is going extremely fast,” Mullin said during an interview with “Fox & Friends.” “The president can’t do another executive order for us to use money, because there’s no more money there.”
Embattled Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, a Florida Democrat, resigned yesterday, moments before the House Ethics Committee was set to consider whether to recommend she be expelled from Congress.
“Rather than play these political games, I chose to step away so that I can devote my time fighting for my neighbors in Florida’s 20th District,” she said in a statement in which she characterized the ethics process as a “witch hunt.”
Last month, an investigative Ethics panel found Cherfilus-McCormick guilty of more than two dozen violations in connection with pending financial-fraud charges levied against her by the federal government. In November, she was indicted by the DOJ.
Kevin M. Warsh, Trump’s pick to lead the Federal Reserve, asserted repeatedly at a combative confirmation hearing yesterday that he would not cut interest rates simply because Trump wanted him to, pledging to be “strictly independent” if confirmed.
The Southern Poverty Law Center was indicted on federal fraud charges alleging it improperly raised millions of dollars to secretly pay leaders of the Ku Klux Klan and other hate groups for inside information, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said.
The DOJ alleges the civil rights group defrauded donors by using their money to fund the very extremism it claimed to be fighting, with more than $3 million paid to informants through a now-defunct program to infiltrate white supremacist and other groups
Gov. Kathy Hochul is doubling down on her plans to roll back the 2019 Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act as the state budget drags on into a fourth week of negotiations past the April 1 deadline.
Hochul continues to try and hammer through her proposed changes to the state’s auto insurance laws, despite skeptical Democrats in the Legislature who haven’t shown signs of acquiescing to her demands.
Hochul marked Israel’s Independence Day with a statement of solidarity, saying in a statement that “New York is proud to be home to the largest Jewish population outside Israel.”
Hochul won’t inject new revenue raising measures into the ongoing state budget talks, she told reporters yesterday during an unrelated news conference.
The governor insisted — yet again — that she’s done raising taxes now that Albany leaders are on board with her plan to impose a new levy on multi-million dollar second homes in New York City.
Protesters blocked the main entrance to the governor’s office at the State Capitol yesterday, demonstrating against Hochul’s proposed changes to New York state climate laws. Eighteen were arrested for obstructing governmental administration.
The state Senate’s majority leader has used state budget talks to press the Hochul administration for answers about the NYPA’s $7.5 million plane, questioning why ratepayers should get stuck with part of the tab for flying execs and board members around.
The state’s Office for the Aging is turning to robots, including machines like ElliQ, in hopes of solving isolation problems in a cost-effective way as New York’s elderly population steadily increases.
According to the most recent data available from the U.S. Energy Information Administration, New York had the fourth-lowest total electricity use per person in January, at about 651 kWh, coming in behind California, Hawaii and Rhode Island.
Our Time for NYC was founded as a nonprofit political group after Mamdani’s election as mayor by members of the Democratic Socialists of America hoping to maintain the organizing energy. But just five months later, Our Time has lost virtually all of its staff.
Mamdani plans to overhaul parts of Brooklyn’s Linden Boulevard, which has grown so dangerous that some lawmakers have deemed it the city’s “new Boulevard of Death.”
On April 9, Mamdani posed for a picture with the New York Mets mascots. Since the joyous photo op, the Mets have not won a game, and some fans are wondering whether it’s the “Curse of the Mambino.”
“I’ll first say that there’s a lot of baseball left to be played and I am still keeping the faith, as I know that many Mets fans are across the city, though I will accept being addressed as Mayor Mambino for the day,” Mamdani said.
New York Knicks fans warned the mayor to steer clear of Madison Square Garden during the team’s playoff run – to block the Curse of the Mambino from spreading to the World’s Most Famous Arena.
A Voodoo King descended on Citi Field yesterday, using a goat’s head and black magic to try to undo the dreaded Curse of the Mambino that saw the Mets lose 11 straight games — but his efforts fell short.
Mamdani is continuing to expand the city’s 3-K program even as the number of parents applying remains roughly the same as last year.
Mamdani is facing growing criticism from left-wing groups and civil rights leaders over his response to a viral video showing NYPD officers beating a man during a mistaken-identity arrest.
Mamdani said the team of police officers responsible for beating a man inside a Brooklyn liquor store last week has been disbanded — and announced a 90-day “top to bottom” review of the NYPD’s narcotics section.
Mamdani defended his administration’s decision to close the 30th Street homeless intake center after an East Village community group sued the city over the planned replacement intake site in that neighborhood.
The city should move ahead with Mamdani’s plan for protected bike lanes and traffic-calming on the entire length of 31st Street in Astoria, the local community board recommended.
Mamdani announced his administration will open seven vacant early childhood education centers this fall, adding about 240 new 3-K seats citywide, including at a long-delayed Downtown Brooklyn site that he said had sat empty for years despite local demand.
Former City Comptroller Scott Stringer claims the bombshell sex assault allegations that derailed his 2021 mayoral campaign were part of a dirty tricks operation hatched by political operatives working for businessman Andrew Yang.
The New York City Council is debating a law that would set time limits on young people’s social media use as concerns grow over its effects on mental health.
The fatal shooting of a 7-month-old girl in her Brooklyn stroller earlier this month stems from a rivalry rooted in status and turf between young men from different public housing developments, the NYPD’s top detective said.
Relatives of the family killed in the helicopter crash in the Hudson River last year are suing the company that operated the sightseeing tour, as well as the company’s owner.
The wrongful death lawsuit, filed by the brother of one victim on behalf of his relatives’ estates, alleges the chopper’s owners, New York Helicopter Charter Inc. and its CEO Michael Roth, operated with “willful and wanton disregard” for human life.
Two Rikers Island correction officers were suspended after a 39-year-old man died in his jail cell last month — the first person to perish at the long-troubled complex this year, according to a recent report by the board that oversees Rikers.
The first day of New York City public school will be unusually late this fall, according to the official 2026-27 school year calendar released Tuesday — forcing families to scramble for child care at the end of summer break.
NYC public school parents are less than enthused over an unusually late school start and one of the most chaotic calendars in recent memory.
An elite Wall Street law firm has apologized to a federal judge for submitting a court filing replete with errors created by artificial intelligence, including “hallucinations” that fabricated case citations.
New York City’s first-ever full-fledged casino offering live table games will open next Tuesday at Resorts World next to the Aqueduct racetrack in Queens.
Trump announced in a post on his social media site Truth Social he was breaking with the New York GOP and endorsing Anthony Constantino for New York’s 21st Congressional District in the race to succeed outgoing North Country Rep. Elise Stefanik.
“Anthony is strongly supported by many of our most Highly Respected MAGA warriors in our movement, including Mayor Rudy Giuliani and Roger Stone!” Trump wrote.
Retiring Rep. Nydia Velázquez is backing Carl Wilson in the race to replace Erik Bottcher on the City Council, deepening her rift with Mamdani as the two continue to line up behind rival candidates in a growing series of proxy fights across the city.
Hudson Valley Republican Rep. Mike Lawler is accusing the campaign of one of his Democratic opponents of forging dozens of voter signatures on petitions to qualify for the June primary ballot, according to an explosive new lawsuit.
A black bear stuck in a tree in Albany drew a crowd of onlookers as the stubborn cub clung to high-up branches even after cops tranquilized it in an hours-long standoff.
The Albany Common Council passed two pieces of legislation critical to Mayor Dorcey Applyrs’ approach to housing and public safety in the city.
The village of Ballston Spa will add another $25,000 to next year’s $7.5 million proposed budget to hire a deputy village clerk to fulfill what Mayor Frank Rossi has described on social media as “an unusual number” of open records requests.
Sherodd Craft, who was released from state prison a year ago after a judge vacated his conviction for a 2001 shooting that killed a teenage girl in Albany, filed a federal lawsuit against the city of Albany and three former city detectives involved in the investigation.
University at Albany want to rebuild the heating system in every building to reach net-zero emissions, taking advantage of the fact that UAlbany’s main buildings were all built at the same time — meaning the infrastructure must be replaced in all of them at once.
This year’s graduating class at Schenectady High School has one more assignment before collecting their diplomas: create a time capsule to replace one from the late 1950s that a construction crew recently found stashed inside a wall of the school.
Photo credit: George Fazio.
