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Case Study: Resiliency Planning
Planning for how communities respond to the increasing impacts of climate change is on all of our minds. In 2014, SSDN was awarded a USDN Innovation Fund Grant to address adaptation and resiliency planning in the southeast. Materials that were presented at the 2015 SSDN Annual Meeting - by Jim Fox of the National Environmental Modeling and Analysis Center (NEMAC) - can be found here.
Five basic steps to Adaptation / Resiliency planning are as follows:
- Identify the Problem – Start by listing both the resources your community has and the hazards your community faces. Your valued resources / assets will be altered according to changes in: social, political, technological; economic, land use and climate landscapes. A sample tool to identify community assets and resources can be found here.
- Determine Vulnerabilities – Figuring out points of social, economic, and environmental vulnerably can help influence decisions and financial priorities. Knowing what’s at stake in the face of various potential crisis scenarios will help your administration determine what to tackle first. You may choose to protect water supply before developing new evacuation routes, for instance. A resource to help with this process can be found here.
- Investigate Options – Understand what routes are available and the risks and rewards of each before deciding on a course of action. Use partner resources to help you with each system topic. For example, EPA has a host of resources for water planning in the face of climate change.
- Evaluate Risks and Costs – What makes sense for one community may not make sense at all for another. Be willing to learn from peer communities, but lean on those partners within your own community who truly understand local assets and vulnerabilities. This is also a good time to learn from others in your region that share the same circumstances. Adaptation resources for the Southeast can be found here.
- Take Action – This is where components of climate action plans and community hazard mitigation plans can integrate. Toolkits abound, like this one.
Bottom Line
It’s good to check the pulse of what communities around you are doing (through networks like SSDN and USDN, for example). But at the end of the day, implement what is right in your community. It could be the next big scalable innovation, even though it seemed like basic common sense at the time you implemented it.
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Funding Opportunities
By Due Date
USDN General RFP – Final Letter of Intent due Tomorrow (July 1)
The USDN 2015 General RFP is soliciting letters of intent to propose for a Steering Committee invitation, available to USDN members. The network is revising its 2014 equity programming in energy efficiency proposal. Contact Erin Gill (Knoxville, TN) if you would like to join this effort.
Sustainability Icons
Tucson, AZ shared sustainability icons, and they are available for download here.
Top SSDN Members Posts
Please continue to share with us what you're learning or needing to know on USDN.org. We look forward to sharing your posts in the newsletter next month.
Can't log on to USDN? SSDN members, reply to this email or send Maggie a note to get log-in information. Posters, be sure to tag the Southeast so everyone can see. A tutorial for the site is here.
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SSDN 2015 Annual Meeting Wrap-Up
Charleston, South Carolina
Thanks to everyone who worked to make SSDN’s fourth annual meeting a success. We hope it was beneficial to each member who attended, and that your daily work is strengthened by it.
- Today (June 30) is the final day to submit reimbursement requests. The form can be found here. Please remember to post your presentations or supporting materials to USDN.org. Use the tag “2015 SSDN Annual Meeting”, and under “Who should see it?”, tag SSDN. Meeting Evaluations: If you didn’t submit an evaluation before you went home, please do so here.
- Access to USDN.org: If you aren’t signed up to share information and search for resources from your peers, or you don’t remember your log in, contact Maggie to get set up.
- 2016 Annual Meeting Location: If you would like to be considered for hosting next year’s annual meeting and didn’t write it on your evaluation form please let Maggie know.
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