Archives
Questions &Answers
Ernest Sternberg, professor of urban and regional planning in the School of Architecture and Planning, is president of Protect New York.
What is Protect New York?
Protect New York is an organization of researchers and educators committed to protecting the state and especially the most vulnerable part of the state, namely metro New York, from disaster and terrorism. Right now, we have about 110 members, of whom about 90 percent are faculty members from more than 20 campuses, mostly SUNY campuses. All of us are engaged in, or in principle interested in, research related to the mitigation of disasters. Our Web page is www.protectnewyork.org. Membership so far is free, but requires a brief essay explaining the nature of the applicant's interest. Students and professionals who can explain the nature of their interest in our mission are welcome as associate members.
How did you get involved in the organization?
For years I've noticed that the subject of disaster and civil defense (homeland security) is overwhelmed with information, but barely touched by theories or concepts that would guide a policy maker. So last year in Albany I chaired one of the "Conversations in the Disciplines" sponsored by SUNY that bring together researchers from several campuses. Our intent was the exploration of this subject as an intellectual territory. We had a wonderfully stimulating event in Albany, with contributors from some 18 disciplines. We actually wound up talking to each other, not past each other. Many of our papers will appear within a week or two in the Journal of Security Education. We reached a consensus then and there that we should form an ongoing organization. We did so this past spring at SUNY Downstate Medical Center in Brooklyn, where we adopted our formal bylaws.
Why does New York State need an organization like Protect New York?
It will come as no surprise that, for most of us, 9/11 was the motivating event. Many of us simply feel affection for the state and for our great sister-city downstate, and know that our work could go some way toward safeguarding them. No one doubts that, to the extent that the U.S. continues to be a target for terrorists, New York City is at the top of the target list. Then again, in the past year, we've seen a severe flood in the state's Delaware River basin, not to mention our own snow disaster right here. Disturbingly, there may be more to come. There are forecasts that, with rising temperatures and sea levels, an intense hurricane that made a beeline for New York City at a particularly unlucky angle could cause sea surge into Manhattan. There also are plausibly catastrophic scenarios of pandemic influenza and terrorism with engineered pathogens. Interest in these subjects comes and goes in the media, with answers suddenly expected when a terrible event occurs. As researchers and educators, we can take a long view, seeking more reliable knowledge about what should be done. We must do so because these risks are going to be with us for the rest of our lifetimes. Yes, the state does need us.
How does this fit in with the UB 2020 strategic strength "Extreme Events: Mitigation and Response"?
At UB, those of us involved in this subject have found a remarkable coalescence of interest among some 70-90 researchers in fields as varied as engineering, medicine, geology, social work, nursing, geography, architecture and urban planning. Our status as home of MCEER, the organization now renamed to be about "extreme event research," has given us national visibility. Our UB colleagues make up the largest single-campus contingent within Protect New York. We're well on our way in making this subject one of UB's strategic strengths.
Is Protect New York sponsoring any upcoming events/activities?
So far, the organization has functioned entirely on volunteer effort. Even our Web page and logo were designed by volunteers. We're proud of our logo: upstate and downstate scenes, foregrounded by a laurel tree, which symbolizes protection and educational accomplishment. Our task now is to raise serious funds. We expect to hold our first state conference in New York City in late fall 2007. SUNY officials are working on allowing us to use SUNY's new Levin Institute in Manhattan.
What question do you wish I had asked, and how would you have answered it?
I was open to being challenged about "terrorism," since the organization has as an explicit mission to foster research on ways of averting or defeating it. Some do hold that the word is undefinable and politicized—that, as some put it, one person's terrorist is another's freedom fighter. But of course, many important words are subject to definitional ambiguities, from democracy to murder. Terrorism can be given precise definitions, such as attacks by nonstate organizations against noncombatants or as the nonstate equivalent of war crimes. In view of substate operations of globally connected malicious groups, some of them very anxious to get hold of destructive weapons that in the past were only available to states, this phenomenon must indeed be studied. Many of our Protect New York members are committed to doing just that.