Uncovering the Effectiveness of Post-Sandy Housing Recovery Efforts in New York City

This thesis seeks to examine the effectiveness of post-Sandy CDBG-DR-funded housing recovery efforts in New York City. Using historical precedents to understand federal disaster policy and to identify its common limitations, this research then attempts to analyze the progress of NYC’s existing housing recovery programs. In order to identify the challenges and limitations of these programs, this thesis utilized information gathered from an inspection of available housing recovery data as well as interviews with representatives of various city, state and federal agencies. By combining the quantified progress of NYC’s housing recovery with the varied perspectives of individuals implementing and guiding these efforts, this research attempted to distill the broad successes and failures of different recovery programs. Taking these lessons, several recommendations are provided with the goal of improving the effectiveness of future CDBG-DR-housing recovery efforts.