After the hurricane, worker co-ops rebuild.

• Author: Nathanson, Rebecca

When Hurricane Sandy touched down in New York City two days before Halloween in October 2012, Luis Casco was in his bungalow in Far Rockaway, New York. Like many other residents of the neighborhood on the Rockaway Peninsula in Queens, he and some friends had decided to wait out the storm. When they finally left, the water was chest-high, and swimming was their only option.

Sandy killed more than 200 people in several countries, including more than 100 in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. At least ninety-seven people died throughout the New York City region, most in the boroughs of Queens and Staten Island. The Rockaways took some of the hardest hits, including widespread flooding and a fire that destroyed more than 100 homes.

The day after the storm made landfall in New York, President Obama declared parts of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut major disaster areas, which opened them up to aid from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). But charity organizations including the Red Cross did not establish a significant presence right away, drawing widespread criticism. The Staten Island borough president called the group's slow response an "absolute disgrace," suggesting residents stop giving it donations.

In the hours and days after the storm, in the Red Cross's absence, an ad-hoc group of former Occupy Wall Street organizers came together to form a disaster relief network named Occupy Sandy. They delivered food and flashlights to public housing projects. They went door-to-door in tall buildings that had lost elevator service, sometimes with elderly residents stranded at the top.

Occupy Sandy volunteers helped transport people to shelters. They provided hot meals and supplies. They opened an Amazon.com registry to let people see exactly what was needed and where it should be sent. They made doctors and lawyers available to people in need of medical attention or legal advice. Donations poured in from around the world, totaling about $1 million in cash, according to Tamara Shapiro, an Occupy Sandy organizer.

The group pursued that immediate disaster relief work for about two months, until the end of December 2012. Then the network began brainstorming ideas for longer-term projects. One became Rockaway Wildfire, a community group focused on empowerment and activism. Another became the Worker-Owned Rockaway Cooperatives program, which aims to develop worker-owned businesses in the Rockaways run by people who faced displacement and unemployment after the hurricane.

It was an initiative that would deliver new hope and fresh opportunity to...