Hochul’s handling of the road closures came under intense scrutiny in the immediate aftermath of the snow squall as photos and videos of motorists stranded on roads circulated widely.
“It is likely that the problem of stranded vehicles was related to the timing for closing roads, a decision controlled by Erie County,” NYU’s experts determined. “Although New York’s prior Governor Andrew Cuomo had historically decreed road closures through executive order during his tenure, current Governor Kathy Hochul, who took office in August 2021, has permitted greater local decision-making around road closures.
Gov. Kathy Hochul allowed “greater local decision-making” before Buffalo was crushed by a once-in-a-lifetime blizzard.The report, commissioned by Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown, revealed that Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz — who, on paper, is the official tasked with making the call unless there’s an emergency order from Hochul — had “expressed concerns” about the travel ban starting too early.
A timeline of the road closures included in the report shows that state Department of Transportation was the first to announce road closures: Theirs came the night before the storm struckThe blizzard left more than 40 people dead.By 8 a.m., that Friday, temperatures had plummeted to the point where snow was falling.
But Poloncarz didn’t declare a state of emergency until 7 a.m. and only announced the county-wide travel ban at 8:45 a.m.Anndel Taylor, 22, died in her car in the Buffalo blizzard.By 9 a.m., visibility on the roads had dropped to zero and the white-out was underway.Buffalo’s Division of Community Services didn’t announce that the city’s schools were closing until nearly an hour later, at 9:43 a.m.
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