It’s getting colder, and there is more urgency in getting shelter for what may be as many as 40,000 newly homeless people.

Here’s a roundup of info about the relief effort around New York City this week. First, today’s post and requests from Occupy Sandy. The crowdsourced relief effort — noted by Slate for getting things done — is headquartered out of St. Jacobi Church in Sunset Park, with multiple donation locations around the city and distribution sites in the hardest hit areas, including the Rockaways, Staten Island, and Coney Island. For the most current updates on their needs and activities, follow Occupy Sandy on Twitter. And to help from a desktop, they set up a shopping list of items on Amazon.

The political director of cable news channel NY1, Bob Hardt,  lives in the Rockaways, and has been describing his experiences first hand  — which are still at odds with the mayor’s reassurance in a press conference on Sunday. The city (and the big organizations, including the Red Cross and the National Guard) will hopefully be improving response during the week, just as the weather turns rougher on Wednesday and Thursday.

The New York Times visited the Rockaways and made this compelling video.

596 Acres is working in the Rockaways, with a vivid description of the challenge in an early post, and more upbeat set of requests in a later post.

A description of the Occupy Sandy method:

Earlier in the week, the Occupy team was among the first to reach the Rockaways, and had a friendly encounter with the National Guard. And cops.