After All Things

Storm watch

Long Islanders brace for heavy rain this evening. A Siena poll says Nassau and Suffolk voters differ on their choice for president. A handful of Connecticut cities lead the nation in DUIs. A coastal resiliency project gets federal funding. And a new research program will explore North American right whale numbers in New England waters.

Duration:: 12m
Broadcast on:: 06 Aug 2024
Audio Format:: mp3

New York Governor Kathy Hochl says New Yorkers should prepare for heavy rain and flash flooding beginning this afternoon. Forecasters expect severe weather conditions to continue until tomorrow morning. They could result in nearly five inches of rain. Hochl says this is different from the stormy conditions expected for this weekend. And I would say when this starts you do not want to be on the roads. With flash flooding conditions change so rapidly and you could end up in a vehicle just a small amount of rain can turn your vehicle into a boat and you are washed away. Tropical Storm Debbie is set to reach New York later this week and is expected to bring additional rain and flooding. Hochl says the state's Emergency Operations Center has been activated for the entire week. You're listening to After All Things, WSHU's Daily News and Culture Update from the Long Island Sound region. Long Islanders are split on their choice for president. A handful of Connecticut cities lead the nation in DUIs. A coastal resiliency project on Fire Island gets federal funding and a new research program will explore North Atlantic right whale numbers in New England waters. Those stories and more are ahead. I'm Sabrina Carone. Former President Donald Trump leads Vice President Kamala Harris in the polls on Long Island, but not by much. WSHU's Aida Ouzenlar has more on a Sienna College poll released today. The data collected from likely voters on Long Island shows Trump leads Harris by six points, but that changes based on counties, says Don Levy. He's the director of the Sienna College Research Institute. In Nassau, Harris leads by three points over Trump while in Suffolk County, Trump has at present a commanding 14 point advantage. So we see a decided difference between how voters in Nassau County feel as opposed to those voters in Suffolk. The Democratic ticket has increased its lead since the beginning of the summer. Biden led Trump by eight points in June. Now, Harris has almost doubled that lead. She's 14 points ahead of Trump across the state. Aida Ouzenlar, WSHU News. New Haven's police chief says the department has increased traffic stops and DUI training for its officers. WSHU's Janice Roman reports. This comes as DUIs are up statewide. New Haven police chief Carl Jacobson says eight people have died in car crashes. Recent federal statistics ranked New Haven, Hartford and Waterbury in the top 25 delia cities for DUI crashes. Jacobson says the increased patrol is especially important this time of year. To me personally and professionally, this really hits the heart. And we're going to continue to put out enforcement and do the best we can to slow down the numbers. The department says it's worked with state police to put in wrong way detectors on highways. Jacobson says they can be an indicator that someone is driving under the influence. Janice Roman, WSHU News. The US Army Corps of Engineers has contracted a Texas company to bolster Fire Island against storms. The $52 million project will repair an already existing coastal erosion project damaged over the last year. WSHU's Molly Ingram has more. The Fire Island inlet to Mariches inlet project was launched in 2014. The goal was to add sand and dunes to the eastern part of Fire Island to stop damage from sea level rise. But heavy storms over the last year have hurt the project. Great Lakes Dredge and Doc Company of Houston, Texas has been hired for the repairs. Two million yards of sand are expected to be pumped onto the beaches from offshore. Officials say they expect construction on the federally funded project to start this fall. It's the first project labor agreement implemented by the Army Corps of Engineers, New York District, Molly Ingram, WSHU News. Researchers are on a mission to learn more about North Atlantic right whale numbers in the Gulf of Maine. More on that is ahead after a message from our supporter. Local support comes from Hartford HealthCare, the only health system in the Northeast, with all its hospitals receiving a grades for safety from the LeapFrog group, the nation's leading independent safety watchdog group, HartfordHealthCare.org. This week is National Farmers Market Week. Connecticut's Department of Agriculture and CT Grown are highlighting the important role the state's farmers play in our food system. Brian Harlbert is the commissioner of the Department of Agriculture. You'll find that farmers markets are a lot more competitive with grocery stores than you might think. So we partner with End Hunger Connecticut on SNAP doubling. So if you're enrolled in SNAP, you can use your SNAP EBT card, work with a market manager, swipe your card for $10, they will give you $20 in vouchers or coupons to purchase produce with. So you're doubling the amount of money you have. Connecticut's agriculture industry generates $4 billion to the state's economy and fosters more than 22,000 jobs. NASA County legislators approved the Mask Transparency Act making wearing a face mask in public a misdemeanor. That does not include face coverings for health or religious reasons. Republicans who voted in favor of the bill say the goal is to prevent people from hiding behind masks to commit crimes. A New Yorkman was arrested Friday for selling marijuana laced with fentanyl at a Norwalk Smoke Shop. Authorities conducted a search on the Zaza Smoke Shop where THC gummies were found to contain 50 times the legal limit of 0.3% of THC. Every spring, North Atlantic right whales were once known to migrate northward from their cabin grounds off the southeastern U.S. to feed in the Gulf of Maine. That started to change about 15 years ago when the endangered whales were seen in the Gulf less frequently and researchers shifted their focus to Cape Cod Bay and the Gulf of St. Lawrence where the population was known to aggregate. This summer the state of Maine launched a research program to get a more accurate picture of where the whales really are. The findings could be critical for the future of the state's lobster industry. Nicole Agrisco reports. As the 100-foot-long whale watch vessel Acadia Explorer idles at the dock in Bar Harbor, passenger Sarah Lighter with the Maine Department of Marine Resources opens her laptop. Okay so this is the game plan for the next two days. She points to a map of the Gulf of Maine, marked with a series of red dots arranged in a grid like pattern that showed the locations of 26 passive acoustic monitors listening for North Atlantic right whales about 30 feet underwater. On this trip, Lighter's team will swap out some of the units that need new batteries but will also do visual surveillance for the whales. They'll travel at 10 knots along a path at zigs and zags in and offshore, stopping first at a point just southwest of Swan's Island. Then along the coastline off of MDI, past mountains are rock over to site six and then we kind of create the same pattern following a U until we get to the last visual waypoint and then we end up back in Bar Harbor. Along the way, the crew scans the water almost constantly looking for signs of marine life. So far this year they've seen humpback, fin, and minky whales but no right whales. All data is equally useful data so those zeros are just as important as finding a pile of right whales. Erin Summers leads DMR's Marine Mammal Research Division, a new initiative that includes the acoustic monitoring, these boat surveys, and now monthly flights over the Gulf of Maine to search for right whales. She says the data that are collected will be used to tell a more accurate story of when the whales are moving and where they are in relation to Maine's lobster fishery. Summer says it's important that if lobstermen are forced to take new steps to prevent fishing gear entanglements, they should have confidence that their efforts actually make a difference. You want to foster that buy-in and have them have some confidence in the information that's being used that affects their daily lives, their income, their culture, their economic you know efficiency, all of that. Patrice McCarron of the Maine Lobstermans Association says the state's research will provide information that the state has lacked since right whale survey efforts dwindled. To have more information about how far offshore they are, what numbers of whales we may or may not be seeing, and how many are randomly coming through closer to shore. You know is it 1 or 5 or 10 or is it 50? And those state researchers have yet to see a right whale firsthand. The network of passive acoustic monitors placed in the Gulf of Maine has picked up several right whale vocalizations like this one. The calls are low and quick and somewhat hard to hear. A right whale sighting here and there is to be expected, McCarron says, but she believes the data will show what fishermen already believe to be true. I think it's the hope of most Maine lobstermen that it's got to document what their knowledge about. The ocean and right whales tells them that right whales are very rare, so rare in fact that many seasoned lobstermen say they've never seen one in Maine's waters. Researchers say that claim is not surprising as most lobster fishing boats are too close to the water to provide a view of whales that feed about four feet below the surface. And Orla O'Brien with the New England Aquarium says it's often difficult to spot right whales in the ocean, even when you're looking for them. The aquarium has increased surveillance flights over the Gulf of Maine this summer. And earlier this month, O'Brien spotted a right whale named Butterfly nursing her calf, about 15 miles southeast of Jonesport. Seeing the long past pair is kind of an indication that, you know, that's one sighting. Well, it means they're like the other sightings out there that we don't catch. But the data gathered in the coming months says Sarah later will provide a more accurate picture of what's really happening in the Gulf of Maine. The research will tell us, you know, we're out here to figure this out, like where they are and when, and we know we've had occasional single animals visiting the Gulf of Maine at really odd times, and this will help us kind of suss some of that out, you know, and figure out what is going on. It's the truth, you know, that's what we're interested in. DMR officials acknowledge that their time is limited. While Congress has delayed federal restrictions on the lobster fishery through 2028, the National Marine Fisheries Service says it wants to restart discussions next year on a new set of rules to protect the species from entanglement. For the New England News Collaborative, I'm Nicole Lagresco. For the latest news from Long Island and Connecticut, you can listen on the radio, stream online at WSHU.org, or download the WSHU app, after all things is supported by Hartford HealthCare. And whether it's news, classical music, or podcasts like this one, they're all made possible with support from our listeners. So as always, thank you so much for listening, and please do share this podcast with your friends. I'm Sabrina Garone. Enjoy the rest of your day. I'll talk to you tomorrow. [Music] [ Silence ]