What we heard: Flooding costs include physical damage but also lost inventory, downtime, labor for cleanup, mold prevention, and lost customers. These costs accumulate over repeated events.  Because getting financial assistance is a lot of additional work, many small businesses feel they have to eat the costs, move on and get back to being open for business. 

What we heard: Small business tenants often bear the risk but lack authority to make structural mitigation possible. So they are left to band-aid a solution or just recover as quickly as possible.  Some landlords may not prioritize mitigation (which can be expensive to really fix it) unless required through building codes (but focus there is newer, larger, expanding buildings) or incentivized through City or State resilient retrofit initiatives (but focus is homeowners, not small biz). 

What we heard: Business owners hesitate to push landlords or report issues due to fear of rent increases, lease non-renewal, or eviction. Yes tenant protections exist under NYC commercial lease norms, but there is little awareness of any protections specifically tied to flooding and small businesses, nor is their appetite to “pick a fight” with the landlord and make things worse.

What we heard: Many small businesses either lack flood insurance or discover too late that policies don’t cover their specific type of flooding (e.g., sewer backup vs. coastal flooding, seepage). Programs like the National Flood Insurance Program don't seem to fit the realities for small commercial tenants, especially for non-coastal, stormwater flooding.  And even if there was, what is the ROI on that vs other potential actions like getting 4 sump pumps? One small business owner said her landlord HAD flood insurance but didn’t want to make the claim as it would raise their deductible by $50K.  So the tenant had to eat some costs that the landlord could have claimed.

What we heard: There are viable mitigation strategies (barriers, backflow preventers, operational protocols), but no clear, trusted pathway for small businesses to assess, prioritize, and implement them. Existing city resources (e.g., NYC SBS guidance or NYC DEP green infrastructure programs) are not packaged in a way that is actionable at the storefront level.

What we heard: Positive response to ideas that “pool risk”, share resources, or operate at the neighborhood level, particularly through groups like Business Improvement Districts (BIDs). Models that combine financing (e.g., retrofit funds, CDFI-led programs like Spring Bank) with local coordination were seen as more viable than individual action alone.

What we heard: Climate impacts are embedded across housing, insurance, utilities, and infrastructure—not just rent. A “cheap” home that floods or overheats is not truly affordable.

What we heard: Flooding triggers cascading financial effects—credit damage, debt accumulation, foreclosure risk—that persist for years and worsen inequality.

What we heard: Many households—especially outside official flood zones—are effectively self-insuring without realizing it, leaving them exposed to catastrophic out-of-pocket losses.

What we heard: Even with “gold standard” disclosures, many people don’t use or can’t act on information due to limited housing options or financial constraints.

What we heard: With ~70% renters and many older, inefficient buildings in risk-prone areas, climate costs are mediated through landlords, policy, and building systems—not individual choice.

What we heard: NYC must continue building affordable housing, often in vulnerable areas, but without sufficient infrastructure investment this locks in long-term risk and cost.

What we heard: No single intervention works—success requires combining household mitigation, neighborhood infrastructure, and regional systems, alongside financing and policy alignment.

What we heard: Communities are already doing resilience work—the city needs to recognize and support this rather than starting from scratch. As one attendee put it: "communities are engaged and already doing the work - take advantage of this vast wealth of knowledge."

Notable examples shared:

What we heard: Clear, repeated message—new housing shouldn't be built in flood-prone areas. Questions raised about Red Hook's Brooklyn Marine Terminal and concerns about the Jewel Streets where "the Jamaica Bay runs under this neighborhood."

Key concern: Are we "prolonging the risk to housing tenants or other low income communities by going on with this project?"

What we heard: 10-year timelines for infrastructure (like sewers in Jewel Streets) don't match the urgency of the climate crisis. We need to expedite capital projects.

What we heard: Concern that resilience projects like floodwalls could push flooding to lower-income communities. The city must address both climate risk AND displacement risk simultaneously.

What we heard: At a city level, make DEP, Sanitation, NYCEM work together vs asking citizens to piece it all together. Multiple city agencies needed to provide climate adaptation solutions.  Yearly inspection and maintenance is critical (Green infrastructure, and NYCHA complexes have "missing parts"). 

What we heard: It takes too long for non-profits to get paid for work city asked us to do.  Request to "pay community members to participate, to compensate for their time, just as consultants and experts are paid." Communities need resources, not just requests for input.