A year after Hurricane Maria, Puerto Ricans settle into new lives in New Jersey

Three weeks after Hurricane Maria tore through her second-floor apartment in Puerto Rico, tearing the the roof off the building and leaving only her bedroom standing, Josyvette Sierra boarded a plane for the first time with her 2-year-old son to join her mother in New Jersey.

Sierra, 25, thought she would stay a few months until conditions on the island improve, but a year after the powerful Category 4 storm made landfall on Sept. 20, 2017, she remains in Passaic County. She has found work, and her son, Kemuel, is learning English. Now she is looking for her own apartment.

“I came for a couple of months, but, look, I stayed,’’ Sierra said last week, speaking in Spanish. “I miss it. I miss Puerto Rico, and maybe one day I will return and leave at peace there. I like New Jersey. I’m getting accustomed to it.”

More than 135,000 Puerto Ricans have relocated to the U.S. mainland in the year since Maria's lashing rain and 150-mph winds destroyed homes and knocked out power and water service across the island, according to data compiled by the Center for Puerto Rican Studies at Hunter College in New York. Gov. Phil Murphy has said that more than 30,000 Puerto Ricans have settled in New Jersey, which is home to around 500,000 residents of Puerto Rican ancestry, trailing only Florida and New York. Experts say the migration is expected to continue while the island grapples with an ongoing economic crisis and high unemployment as it struggles to recover from the storm.

Read more: https://www.northjersey.com/story/news/new-jersey/2018/09/19/hurricane-maria-year-later-puerto-ricans-find-new-lives-nj/1302707002/