Resilience in Vulnerable Communities: When Climate Change Forces Relocation

This two-part series will explore three situations of vulnerable communities adapting to and surviving the threats of climate change and urban development and present planning best practices. First, Sally Russell Cox with the State of Alaska will share her work with four communities and the reports she co-authored on a relocation framework and the unmet infrastructure needs of Alaska Native villages due to erosion, flooding, and permafrost thaw. Then, Pat Forbes with the State of Louisiana, will describe the Isle de Jean Charles project. This marsh island has lost 98% of its land due to sea level rise and coastal land loss, which is forcing the resettlement of the community that inhabited that land for generations. The speakers will demonstrate how citizen participation is critical to the relocation and cultural preservation and describe how interagency collaboration is critical to ensure housing affordability and infrastructure planning. This is the first of a two-part series looking at resilience in vulnerable communities. The second part will look at the Gullah-Geechee community and their resilience in the face of urban development encroachment.

Host: American Planning Association, Housing & Community Development Division

[bige]

Does climate change really have to always end in relocation? It seems better to design with sustainability in first place, or after and stay in area. It's not climate change causing, it's constructing in areas of environment that shouldn't have been occupied in first place.