{"id":346160,"date":"2025-10-31T18:35:14","date_gmt":"2025-10-31T18:35:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/346160\/"},"modified":"2025-10-31T18:35:14","modified_gmt":"2025-10-31T18:35:14","slug":"flooding-caused-severe-damage-at-new-rochelle-ny-nonprofit-building","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/346160\/","title":{"rendered":"Flooding caused severe damage at New Rochelle NY nonprofit building"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"play\"<\/p>\n

Route 287 in Tarrytown inundated by flash flooding Oct. 30. See video<\/p>\n

An afternoon storm brought flash flooding to southern Westchester on Thursday, Oct. 30. See footage from Route 287 in Tarrytown. [John Meore\/The Journal News]<\/p>\n

Flooding from a storm Thursday, Oct. 30<\/a>, caused significant damage to the New Rochelle building housing the United Community Center of Westchester<\/a>, forcing the nonprofit to close its physical location.<\/p>\n

The damage is so severe that the community service organization\u2019s building at 358, 360 and 362 North Ave. was deemed unsafe by the City of New Rochelle\u2019s Bureau of Buildings Department of Development as of Thursday, as indicated by a legal notice addressed to the owner that\u2019s posted in the window.\u00a0<\/p>\n

UCCW provides a wide swath of community services that are likely to be disrupted as a result of the closure.<\/p>\n

UCCW’s emergency food pantry<\/a>, for instance, usually operates from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday, serving community members in need from Westchester County and surrounding areas like the Bronx.\u00a0It’s unclear whether they’ll be able to operate from the building in the near future.<\/p>\n

Local weather: <\/strong>How much rain did we get in the Lower Hudson Valley Oct. 30? See the inch counts<\/a><\/p>\n

‘It literally looked like it was raining inside the center’<\/p>\n

According to UCCW\u2019s Development Officer Ana Hercules, for the last two years, there have been leaks in the building.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery time it rains, the water comes in,\u201d she said. \u201cThe landlord has been saying that there’s no issue with the roof. So he’ll come and he’ll patch.”<\/p>\n

\u201cYesterday,\u201d Hercules continued, \u201cit literally looked like it was raining inside the center, and the lights started flickering.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

At that point, Hercules said she called the fire department, who broke through the ceiling to release trapped water, flooding parts of the building. The building department then cut off both power and heat due to safety concerns.\u00a0<\/p>\n

According to Hercules, the building department found that the drainage system was not up to code, which is what was causing rainwater to back up and leak through weak spots in the ceiling.<\/p>\n

More: <\/strong>Hochul declares food emergency, approves $65M to reduce SNAP benefits cutoff impact in NY<\/a><\/p>\n

UCCW food pantry addresses New Rochelle’s ‘severe’ need<\/p>\n

The closure left UCCW\u2019s emergency food pantry in limbo at a time of heightened need.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the last month, there\u2019s been so much need for the food pantry that the pantry has actually been bare for most of the month because we\u2019ve had so many people come in,\u201d Hercules explained. \u201cYou wouldn’t think of it because New Rochelle is one of the up and coming areas in Westchester, but the need here is severe.\u201d<\/p>\n

The center has been looking for other nonprofits to take its perishable food before it spoils, Hercules said, like Choice of New York<\/a>, or the nearby HOPE Community Services<\/a>. On Friday, Oct. 31, a day after the building was shut down, UCCW staff members stood outside giving away half gallons of milk so that it wouldn\u2019t go to waste.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe really have to think creatively, because there\u2019s significant need in this community right now,\u201d Hercules said. The UCCW staff may explore distributing among area churches the food they would normally give out.\u00a0<\/p>\n

How to help: <\/strong>SNAP benefits cutoff spurs emergency efforts at Hudson Valley food pantries<\/a><\/p>\n

When will the UCCW building reopen?<\/p>\n

The timeline for reopening is unclear, Hercules said. The building must be inspected by an electrician before power can be restored, she added, and there are concerns about mold development. She said the building department also found a structural code violation in the basement that the owner must address.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Despite the challenges, UCCW remains committed to serving the community. \u201cWe\u2019ll get through it,\u201d Hercules said. \u201cI know we will.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Route 287 in Tarrytown inundated by flash flooding Oct. 30. See video An afternoon storm brought flash flooding…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":346161,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5122],"tags":[2696,2701,5229,24023,70993,3059,2556,2697,454,8771,7065,14233,44566,5371,425,728,451,635,170079,405,403,50,5226,5225,5228,5227,450,457,256,170078,5677,3161,5681,646,67,586,132,5230,68,2969,313,54665,14549],"class_list":{"0":"post-346160","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-accidents","9":"tag-accidents-u0026-disasters","10":"tag-america","11":"tag-charity","12":"tag-charity-u0026-philanthropy","13":"tag-county","14":"tag-development","15":"tag-disasters","16":"tag-government","17":"tag-hochul","18":"tag-housing","19":"tag-housing-u0026-development","20":"tag-kathy","21":"tag-kathy-hochul","22":"tag-local","23":"tag-local-news","24":"tag-negative","25":"tag-new","26":"tag-new-rochelle","27":"tag-new-york","28":"tag-new-york-city","29":"tag-news","30":"tag-newyork","31":"tag-newyorkcity","32":"tag-ny","33":"tag-nyc","34":"tag-overall","35":"tag-overall-negative","36":"tag-philanthropy","37":"tag-rochelle","38":"tag-services","39":"tag-social","40":"tag-social-services","41":"tag-u0026","42":"tag-united-states","43":"tag-united-states-of-america","44":"tag-unitedstates","45":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","46":"tag-us","47":"tag-usa","48":"tag-weather","49":"tag-westchester","50":"tag-westchester-county"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346160","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=346160"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346160\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/346161"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=346160"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=346160"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=346160"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}