Dr. Sara Hamideh, Principle Investigator
Sara Hamideh is an associate professor of sustainability studies at Stony Brook University. She studies housing recovery inequalities after disasters to identify resource needs and effective recovery policy levers. She has conducted longitudinal and interdisciplinary modeling of the housing recovery in seasonal and year-round housing submarkets in tourist-based communities based on physical and social vulnerabilities. She also looks at the role of social vulnerability in access to recovery decision-making for marginalized groups such as public housing residents. Dr. Hamideh teaches courses in disaster resilience, sustainable communities, environmental planning, and planning analytical methods.
Current Research Group
Farinaz Motlagh, PhD Student
Farinaz is a Ph.D. Candidate in Marine Sciences at the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences, Stony Brook University. She holds a B.Sc. in Industrial Economics from Shahid Beheshti University in Iran and an M.Sc. in Integrated Water Resources Management from TH Köln in Germany. Farinaz’s research is focused on evaluating the equity and effectiveness of federal flood mitigation spending programs and demonstrating disparities in the distribution of resources and funds through a mixed-methods research design. She also works on a project exploring opportunities, challenges, and consequences of equitable public and private funding sources in coastal municipalities. In her free time, Farinaz enjoys embarking on outdoor adventures and exploring diverse landscapes.
Melina Matos, FAU Assistant Professor
Melina Matos is an Assistant Professor of Urban and Regional Planning at the Charles E. Schmidt College of Science at Florida Atlantic University. Melina has been working on the community engagement efforts within the Center of Excellence for Risk-Based Community Resilience Planning. She is specialized in disaster recovery, climate adaptation, and community resilience. Her research agenda focuses on developing and deploying strategies to create innovative, sustainable, and resilient communities. Matos has worked on several resilience grants from National Science Foundation and the National Institute of Standards and Technology.
LinkedIn – Melina Matos
ResearchGate – Melina Matos
Isaac Nikolic, MA Student
Isaac recently graduated with his M.A. in Marine Conservation & Policy from SBU. He graduated from SBU in 2021 with a B.A in Sustainability Studies. Isaac’s research has been focused on qualitative policy analysis about coastal housing development patterns and trends in relation to disaster vulnerability and resilience. This qualitative analysis will be used to develop policy recommendations and evaluation tools. Isaac is interested in coastal protection and restoration work. He participated in the Long Island Shellfish Restoration Program in 2022 and has a fellowship from the Peconic Estuary Partnership to create educational documents for homeowners seeking to create living shoreline projects.
Peter Martin, MA Student
Peter recently graduated with his M.A. in Marine Conservation & Policy from SBU. He graduated from SBU in 2022 with a B.A. in Environmental Studies. Peter’s research has been focused on qualitative policy analysis about coastal housing development patterns and trends in relation to disaster vulnerability and resilience. This qualitative analysis will be used to develop policy recommendations and evaluation tools. Peter is also interested in ecology, land resource management, and spending time outdoors. He currently works as a marine lab assistant for Cornell Cooperative Extension of Suffolk County.
LinkedIn – Peter Martin
Tyler Potter, MA Student
Tyler recently graduated with his M.A. in Marine Conservation & Policy from Stony Brook University. He graduated in 2022 with a B.A. in Environmental Studies and a Minor in Marine Science. Tyler’s research has been focused on qualitative policy analysis about coastal housing development patterns and trends in relation to disaster vulnerability and resilience. This qualitative analysis will be used to develop policy recommendations and evaluation tools. Tyler is also interested in conservation, forestry management, fisheries management, hiking, camping and traveling. He is currently working on his Capstone Project assessing the economic impact of recreational saltwater fishing in New York State for the Department of Environmental Conservation.
Ania Pracel, Undergraduate Student
Ania recently graduated from Stony Brook University with a B.A. in Environmental Design, Policy, and Planning. Ania’s research has focused on evaluating the impacts of Hurricane Ian on affordable housing in Collier and Lee Counties, FL. This includes creating profiles, archival histories, and conducting qualitative and quantitative analysis for case study communities. In addition to housing resilience, Ania is interested in transit-oriented development, resilient planning, and geospatial sciences.
Erin Witt, Undergraduate Student
Erin recently graduated with a B.A. in Environmental Design, Policy, and Planning from Stony Brook University and is currently pursuing her master’s certificate in Geospatial Information Systems at Hunter College. Erin’s research has been focused on developing profiles for the different communities and to do qualitative analysis of policy documents for the counties of Lee and Collier.
LinkedIn – Erin Witt
Sean Mello, Undergraduate Student
Sean is an undergraduate student at Stony Brook University, currently pursuing a degree in Sustainability Studies. Sean’s research is focused on qualitative policy analysis about coastal housing development patterns and trends in relation to disaster vulnerability and resilience. This qualitative analysis will be used to develop policy recommendations and evaluation tools. He is also working as a Hydrologic Technician for the U.S.G.S. Sean is interested in resilient planning, and geology and in his free time he enjoys backpacking.
Payel Sen, PhD in Political Science (2023)
Payel graduated with a PhD in Political Psychology from Stony Brook University in 2023. Payel has published qualitative reaserch with Dr. Hamideh on the experiences of vulnerable and underrepresented groups in educational and housing recovery following tornadoes and wildfires. Currently, she is working on qualitative policy analysis about coastal housing development patterns and trends in relation to disaster vulnerability and resilience. She is a researcher with formal training in experimental research methods, qualitative and quantitative analysis, and has leveraged her skills across diverse product spaces like social media, climate-tech, health-tech and academia to inform strategic and tactical roadmaps.
LinkedIn – Payel Sen
Asha Venugopalan
Asha is a PhD Candidate at the Department of Political Science at Stony Brook University. She holds an MSc in Political Science and Political Economy from the London School of Economics (UK) and a BA in Political Science, Economics and Sociology from Christ University (India). Asha is a quantitative social scientist with interests in public opinion research and computational social science. Prior to joining the PhD program, she was a researcher at Azim Premji University (India) where she developed large public opinion surveys to capture the social and political attitudes of citizens during the inter-election period. Her research interests lie at the intersection of group identities, prejudicial attitudes, and political communication in a polarised political environment. Currently, she is working on a project looking at the distribution in access to financial resources across social groups and the impact of financial resources on housing recovery in post-disaster communities.
LinkedIn – Asha Venugopalan
Former Research Group
Megan Gallagher
Megan Gallagher graduated from SBU in 2021 with a B.A. in Environmental Humanities with a minor in Ecosystems and Human Impact. Interested in working with the public as well as having a passion for the environment, Megan participated in a field study in the Rocky Mountains and holds a position as a Senior Hydroponic Farm Technician at the Freight Farm on Stony Brook’s West campus. She also conducted research on former Suffolk County planner Dr. Lee Koppelman, which led to the production of a documentary that is available for viewing on the SoMAS website. The core of her research work focuses on the building of resilience in communities across the United States where they will be able to better mitigate the impacts of natural disasters through informational tools and resources developed by this research.
Sayma Khajehei
Sayma Khajehei is an Assistant Professor of Geography at Towson University in theDepartment of Geography and Environmental Planning in the College of Liberal Arts. She recently completed her PhD in Urban Planning at the University of Utah. Sayma She completed her masters degree with Dr. Hamideh in community and regional planning at Iowa State University in 2019 where she explored the recovery challenges of public housing residents in Lumberton, North Carolina, in the aftermath of Hurricane Matthew. Her research examines the housing resilience of socially vulnerable populations to natural hazards focusing on how institutional actors impact post-disaster housing recovery disparities of vulnerable people to plan for more socially just and sustainable communities. She has received research grants from FEMA Region 8 and the Natural Hazards Center to support her Ph.D. research. She was a fellow of the Global Change and Sustainability Center at the University of Utah in 2019-2020 and a University Climate Change Coalition (UC3) fellow in 2021-2022. She has a bachelor’s degree in Architectural Engineering from Shiraz University and a master’s degree in Post-Disaster Reconstruction from Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran, Iran.