‘Anxiety every time:’ City of Canandaigua reacts to floods, EF-0 tornado all in the past year

CANANDAIGUA, N.Y. (WROC) — It’s been a busy 24 hours, or better yet, a busy year for the City of Canandaigua. From intense flooding back from this time last year to what has now been classified as an EF-0 tornado touching down Monday night.

“It was wicked scary, very traumatic. And the result of which is create a lot of anxiety every time we have any major, other similar type of activity in the area,” Maria Bucci said.

That’s Maria Bucci: recounting the intense flooding that hit the City of Canandaigua in July of 2023. Maria and her husband have lived in Canandaigua for more than 20 years in a neighborhood that she says is considered a hotspot for storm damage.

“It is in the flood zone, we knew that going in, we’re required to have flood insurance, as a condition of our mortgage,” Bucci said.

Since the floods of last July, Bucci says she’s put nearly $35,000 back into her home to get it looking like it once did.

Monday night’s storms causing the water that flows through nearby the area’s Sucker Brook to build up.

In the mix of those storms, part of which we now know was as an EF-0 tornado, people who saw the storm firsthand weren’t all that shocked.

“It’s just been crazy weather. When you have hot and humid weather like this, this is what you get! This is how you get super storms like that,” Christopher Baart said.

“I’m a native Upstate New Yorker. I grew up in Wayne County, lived in Elmira, for my high school years, went to college, and now here in Canandaigua. It just seems like the intensity of the storms are much greater,” Bucci said.

Bucci is not the only one who has had to shell out the money for repairs. City of Canandaigua Mayor Bob Palumbo says between last year’s floods and this year’s storms, they’ve come at a price.

“The trees, and we’ll have to see about, you know, you know, what we can do to, you know, plant new trees. So as far as the economic impact of what happened last night, is nowhere near what it was last year,” Mayor Palumbo said.

Mayor Palumbo says the City has applied for state and federal grants to use towards shoring up bridges in the area. He also says the City is in the process of working with farmers in the Town of Canandaigua to acquire land to make bigger retention areas.

101g2199.Mov / (mayor bob palumbo / city of canandaigua) 9:20:43 “This isn’t anything that’s going to happen overnight, any, the corrections aren’t going to happen overnight,” Mayor Palumbo said.

And Mayor Palumbo says he is working with the state as well as the county to help get areas such as Kershaw Park and anywhere else that’s been impacted back on their feet.

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