Not everyone's so keen on attributing the East Coast's most recent freakish storm to global warming—especially not while all these gays are getting married!—but it turns out most New Yorkers are sticking with a little thing called science. Yesterday, Siena College released the results of a poll that showing over two thirds of New Yorker voters believe Hurricane Sandy was caused by climate change.
Out of 822 registered New York State voters interviewed last week, 69 percent said recent storms like Sandy and Tropical Storm Irene "demonstrate global climate change rather than representing isolated weather events," something on which Mayor Bloomberg and Governor Cuomo agree as well. And they're also down with coming up with ways to protect New York from future weather devastation and those pesky rising sea levels: 72 percent of those surveyed said they favor a major infrastructure project (storm surge barriers, perhaps?) that could offer such protection.
New Yorkers were also pretty happy with Cuomo's, Bloomberg's and President Obama's handling of the storm—67 percent approved of Cuomo's performance, with 61 percent and 60 percent saying Obama and Bloomberg did a fair-to-excellent job, respectively. But unsurprisingly, those polled were not too pleased with the Long Island Power Authority, which has been harshly criticized for taking far too long to restore power post-storm: 60 percent of Long Islanders said LIPA performed poorly. Con Edison, whose response garnered complaints from customers of all creeds and ages, ended up earning a 54 percent approval rating from city residents, and the MTA racked up a 63 percent approval.
