Governor Andrew M. Cuomo has declared a State of Emergency for St. Lawrence, Cayuga, Jefferson, Monroe, Niagara, Orleans, Oswego and Wayne counties as water levels on Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River continue to rise.

The governor's order directs state agencies to protect State property and to assist local governments and individuals in responding to and recovering from the flooding.

"We are preparing now for the reoccurrence of the 2017 flooding situation, which as people remember was devastating and caused a lot of damage and a lot of hardship for thousands of New Yorkers. We're talking about the entire shoreline of Lake Ontario, so it's hundreds of miles of New York State property," Governor Cuomo said.

In addition to the 200 New York National Guard activated by the Governor to assist with preparedness operations, 200 members of the New York National Guard are on standby for immediate deployment in the eight counties impacted by Lake Ontario flooding.

To date, the State has deployed 20 sandbaggers, over one million empty sandbags and 560,000 filled sandbags, hundreds of pumps, and over 5,000 feet of aquadam to the impacted regions.

The Governor is also urging local officials to work with their County Emergency Managers to submit any resource needs directly into NY Responds, the state's web-based system that enables both local governments and state agencies to submit and share vital emergency-related information and resource requests.

Emergency Managers may also submit requests through the New York State Watch Center at 518-292-2200 if they are unable to access NY Responds at the time.