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The Federal Highway Administration has indefinitely held up approval of New York’s congestion pricing plan - one of NYLCV’s priorities - refusing to raise any substantive concerns. NYLCV is working with other advocates to reach out to New York’s Congressional delegation and President-elect Biden’s transition team to emphasize the need to support transportation, and we are hopeful that we will see positive action on congestion pricing early in 2021.

We expect 2021 to be a year in which the federal government takes decisive action to help New York State achieve its nation-leading climate goals.

Mayor de Blasio recently signed Intro 1947 into law. The bill expands Local Law 97, which last year put limits on carbon emissions from buildings, to include many rent-regulated buildings which were originally excluded.

More than 125 organizations including NYLCV joined together to hold a virtual lobby day in support of a range of environmental programs. Cutting environmental funding in 2021 would be pennywise and pound foolish, and we were glad to find on November 10th that so many of our state legislators agree.

The NYC Mayor’s Office recently released the long-awaited OneNYC 2020 Progress Report. While New York City’s social justice agenda is on the right track with the majority of its initiatives, there is still a long way to go to reach its environmental goals.

To add to the extraordinariness of 2020, this year also marks a historic and destructive Atlantic hurricane season. So far, 11 named storms have made landfall in the U.S. mainland, breaking the previous record of 9 storms set in 1916.

The New York City Council Committee on Resiliency and Waterfronts held an oversight hearing to coincide with the eighth anniversary of Superstorm Sandy. NYLCV testified that while the steps taken by the City have been critical for affected communities, New York needs to establish its own resiliency plan for future emergencies rather than rely on federal emergency funding.