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NOVEMBER 2021
Thank You for Making October an Incredible Month of Dialogue and Partnership!
On October 27, we wrapped up our final week of the 2021 Annual Partnership Forum - “Alliances for Climate Action” co-hosted with FEMA and NASA.
If you attended any or all of the sessions, we would greatly value your feedback to ensure we continue to deliver content that is impactful and actionable. Please provide any feedback, thoughts, and/or questions here or send it to us directly at FEMA-ResilientNation@fema.dhs.gov.
A few major highlights from the Forum:
- 3,250 live viewers throughout the month of October.
- Over 800 unique organizations represented.
- 37 speakers representing 31 organizations.
You can watch the recordings of each week on the FEMA YouTube channel.
In the coming months, the Resilient Nation Partnership Network team will be collaborating with the speakers you saw throughout October to co-create the “Building Alliances for Climate Action” resource to promote action among our network of partners and beyond. Last year, this resulted in the completion of our first co-created resource, Building Alliances for Equitable Resilience. We look forward to sharing the collaborative climate resource in 2022.
Thanks again for your participation and support!
To continued partnership,
The Resilient Nation Partnership Network
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Upcoming Events
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NOAA: Showcasing Leading Practices in Climate Adaptation – Experiences from the Water Sector to Empower Other Sectors and Communities Webinar Series, Thursdays through February 17, 2022
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Climate Adaptation Engineering Case Studies, November 18, 2021
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DHS Center for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, FEMA’s Grant Programs Directorate, and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency: Nonprofit Security Grant Program Webinar, November 19, 2021
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Waterfront Alliance: WEDG® (Waterfront Edge Design Guidelines) Professionals Course,
January 20-21, 2022
Funding Opportunities
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National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine: The Gulf Research Program at the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine is seeking proposals for projects that adapt and implement existing evidence-based interventions that address adverse disaster-related mental health for at-risk communities that are disproportionately affected by disasters.
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Proposals are due on Monday, December 6, 2021 by 5 p.m. ET.
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Award selection and notification will be February 7, 2022.
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The anticipated funding date is March 8, 2022.
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NOAA RISA Program: NOAA is accepting applications for Regional Integrated Science and Assessments (RISA) teams in the West, Southwest, Central Midwest, and U.S. Caribbean, collaborative planning activities in Appalachia and the Upper Northeast, and research on complex fiscal pathways for climate adaptation in rural areas across the U.S.
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Deadline: January 11, 2022
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Partner News
The White House: Biden Administration Makes Climate Information and Decision Tools More Accessible
The Biden administration has launched a whole-of-government initiative to deliver accessible and actionable information to individuals and communities that are being hit by flooding, drought, wildfires, extreme heat, coastal erosion, and other intensifying climate impacts. This effort will put authoritative and useful information into the hands of more Americans.
NOAA: Public Comment Period for Report on Conserving and Restoring America The Beautiful
Since the release of the report, NOAA has been actively seeking input from stakeholders on how to use the existing legal authorities to conserve and restore America’s ocean, coasts and Great Lakes. NOAA has received written comments and heard from stakeholders during a series of virtual listening sessions. All input received since the release of the report will be considered equally with the input the administration receives through the Federal Register notice.
Instructions on how to submit a comment, as well as the specific topics on which NOAA is seeking input, are available here. Interested persons are invited to submit comments to the Federal eRulemaking Portal on or before December 28, 2021.
The National Institute of Standards and Technology: Community Resilience Program
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Community Resilience Program is investigating the experiences and expectations of local staff and officials with respect to community resilience, adaptation, and sustainability planning. Responses will help us understand current community needs and develop future tools and support. For any questions, please contact matthew.malecha@nist.gov.
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine: Incorporating Lessons Learned during COVID-19 into Future Planning for Emergencies and Disasters
The COVID-19 pandemic prompted the largest emergency response activation in the nation’s history, creating unfamiliar challenges for public health, emergency management, and an array of organizations not typically involved in such operations. In some areas, compound disasters exacerbated the strain on resources and required additional adjustments. Reflecting on lessons from the start of the pandemic, we identify measures needed to improve preparedness for complex and compound emergencies and provide strategies to promote equity and justice in disaster-related programming and practice.
The Pew Charitable Trusts: Community and Business Leaders Form Coalition Calling for Flood Policy in Tennessee
A group of Tennessee mayors, emergency managers, homeowners, and business leaders recently launched Flood Ready Tennessee, a coalition dedicated to finding common sense solutions to address the human and financial impacts of flooding across the state. In the wake of deadly August flooding in Middle Tennessee, coalition members, including more than 20 local government officials, are calling on state lawmakers to develop a statewide flood preparedness plan, support local planning and project development, and invest in flood mitigation projects and resilient infrastructure. Pew’s Flood-Prepared Communities team provides additional perspective on the challenges of flooding and proposed solutions put forward by the coalition’s recommendations.
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OHSEPR: U.S. Repatriation Program Awards Funds to United Way, National Association of Social Workers, and American Public Human Services Association to Support U.S. Citizens Evacuated from Afghanistan
The Administration for Children and Families’ (ACF) Office of Human Services Emergency Preparedness and Response (OHSEPR) has awarded $225,000 to nongovernmental human services partners to amplify OHSEPR’s support to U.S. citizens evacuated from Afghanistan.
Blackstone Watershed Collaborative: New Watershed-Scale Partnership in the Home of the Industrial Revolution – the Blackstone River
The Blackstone Watershed Collaborative (MA/RI) launched in September, with more than 100 organizations working to complete 20 priority actions to create a healthier, more resilient watershed by addressing the industrial past, ongoing urbanization, and the impacts of climate change.
NOAA RISA: Fiscal Policy for Advancing Climate Adaptation
Headwaters Economics led a working group of NOAA RISA network members to discuss interactions of fiscal policies and climate adaptation. The group identified research opportunities and solutions needed to stabilize local revenue and direct climate resilience resources to underserved communities.
New Comment Article: Deploy Heat Officers, Policies and Metrics
Cities need heat governance to plan for extreme temperatures and protect those most at risk. Unlike for flooding or wildfire, no single organization or department is responsible for coordinating responses for extreme heat. The impacts of extreme heat will intensify. Many residents don’t have the resources to cope. A handful of places have taken action but much more remains to be done.
MA Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs: Massachusetts Municipal Vulnerability Preparedness (MVP) Program Request for Responses
The MA Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs seeks a partner team to formulate a planning process, training, and resources for updating Municipal Vulnerability Preparedness Program plans in advance of the program’s five-year anniversary. The Request for Response closes on November 22, 2021 at 5 p.m. ET.
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NOAA: NOAA’s Climate Program Office (CPO) Awards Over $171 Million for Climate Science, Community Resilience
NOAA is supporting nine RISA teams in U.S. regions, four regional planning projects in the Southeast and Caribbean, 20 adaptation sciences projects focused on vulnerable coastal communities, and 10 research projects on air quality in urban areas, among others.
GBCI: Infrastructure Resilience through PEER and SITES
GBCI’s new Profiles of Resilience series showcases a broad spectrum of resilience strategies employed by land development and power system projects certified under the SITES and PEER programs, including measures such as stormwater management, habitat restoration, smart technology, community building, and climate risk management.
FEMA: 5 Ways FEMA is Tackling the Climate Crisis
In many ways, climate change will be the greatest challenge of this century and will require new ways of thinking, working, and partnering together to improve the outlook for future generations. Building resilience to the effects of climate change is an undertaking that involves every community, family, and individual. To meet this challenge, we’re creating new ways to unify FEMA’s many programs, operations, and resources.
EDF: Call to Action – USACE Must Evolve to Meet the Growing Demands of Climate-fueled Flood Risk
EDF and nearly 100 organizations and experts sent a call to action urging the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to usher in a new era of comprehensive, equitable, and nature-based flood risk reduction to meet the challenges of compound flood risk in a changing climate.
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Update from the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) Blog
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 EDF Blog: Natural Infrastructure Can Address Growing Climate Impacts and Save Hundreds of Billions of Dollars Annually in the Process.
New report from the International Institute for Sustainable Development shows that natural infrastructure can address climate impacts while saving hundreds of billions of dollars annually. Policymakers and planners worldwide should use this to innovate risk mitigation and prioritize natural infrastructure for climate resilience.
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 EDF Blog: New Army Corps Guidelines will Expand Natural Infrastructure to Reduce Flood Risk and More.
New international guidelines from the USACE provide technical guidance and recommendations for engineers, planners, and decision-makers on the use of natural- and nature-based features. This effort will help inform future action, investment, and collaboration for nature-based solutions to reduce flood risk.
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 EDF Action Blog: A Game-Changing Flood Bond is on the Ballot for Virginia Beach this November.
The City of Virginia Beach voted overwhelmingly to approve a bond that will help accelerate implementation of over 20 flood mitigation projects across the city, generate an estimated $15 return on investment for every dollar spent, and create over 3,000 jobs.
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 EPA: Flood Mitigation Findings from Baltimore
The Baltimore Urban Waters Flood Science and Policy Action Report is EPA’s summary of a regional flood mitigation workshop organized by the Baltimore Urban Waters Partnership in 2020.
The workshop focused on identifying gaps between flood science and regulatory frameworks and producing recommendations to guide future partnership efforts to address regional flooding in central Maryland, especially related to social vulnerability and community resilience building.
It highlights findings and recommendations about flood science and impacts, technical resources, government coordination, equity and social vulnerability, and outreach/education.
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 FEMA: The Long-Term Community Resilience Exercise Resource Guide
The impacts of climate change are being felt today in communities across the country and increasingly test our resilience.
The 2021 Long-Term Community Resilience Exercise Resource Guide is a “one-stop–shop" for any jurisdiction or organization looking to conduct a climate-focused exercise. This guide equips users with a dictionary that has common terms to ensure a shared understanding of climate-related terminology and principles before an exercise; tools and templates for planning and conducting climate-focused exercises; and resources including funding opportunities, risk assessments, and training programs.
Please email us with questions or to share how you are using the Long-Term Community Resilience Exercise Resource Guide.
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Technical Assistance Available
Enterprise Community Partners: Resilience Southeast Academy
There are two sessions left in Enterprise's Southeast Resilience Academy, guiding owners, operators, and developers of affordable housing to prepare their properties and protect residents from increasingly severe climate hazards.
Session 5, Navigating Funding Opportunities, will be hosted on Thursday, December 2, 2021.
Session 6, Built Environment: New Construction, will be hosted on Thursday, December 16, 2021.
For questions about the Resilience Academy program, please contact the team at resilienceacademy@enterprisecommunity.org.
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Resilient Innovation Hub: Resilient Citizens Corp and Regional Resiliency Operations Center
The Resilient Innovation Hub is pleased to announce the launch of the first-ever Resilient Citizens Corp with Houston Community College. We recognize the immediate and near-term employment landscape has changed and aim to adopt strategies, plans, and implementation to move individuals into new opportunities that affect society, communities, and economic development. All the technology, equipment, and data science in the world cannot be fully exploited without the workforce to install, operate, and maintain these new innovations across engineering, construction, facilities management, energy and water infrastructure, and more. There are seven opportunities with specific workforce and skills development credentialing and potential for national expansion.
For more information, contact Richard Seline at rseline@resilienceinnovationhub.com.
New Resources
NASA: Earth Science Data System
NASA’s Earth Science Data Pathfinders aid decision makers and communities in accessing NASA data and resources. The Disasters and Sea Level Change Pathfinders provide links to datasets, guidance on dataset suitability, and links to tools for data visualization and analysis.
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USDA: The Stewardship Mapping and Assessment Project (STEW-MAP)
Across the country, people are planting and caring for trees, establishing community gardens, planning river cleanups, and organizing many other community greening efforts—becoming the stewards of their local environment. The STEW-MAP is a research tool, community organizing approach, and partnership mapping platform developed by scientists at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Northern Research Station. STEW-MAP provides insights that local government and civic groups can use to enhance the capacity of local stewardship activities.
HARC: Climate Planning with Curated Information
The Houston Advanced Research Center (HARC) Resilience Science Information Network (RESIN Portal) brings together climate indicators to help communities create performance-focused resilience plans to prepare for and adapt to future climate conditions. Contact us to have data for your region added to this portal.
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NOAA: The Award-Winning Climate.gov Website Launched A Newly Redesigned Version to Provide Clear Climate Science and Information
Demand for climate information from NOAA continues to grow rapidly. The improvements in the latest version of the site focus on user experience, specifically, major improvements in mobile responsiveness and a custom-built search tool that will join Climate.gov to its sister site, the U.S. Climate Resilience Toolkit. The tool will allow visitors to more easily find maps, data, stories, videos, and adaptation tools from across both sites.
EPA: Local Partnerships Leading Climate Resiliency
FEMA: The New FEMA Building Sciences Resources Library
FEMA is excited to announce the launch of its new resource library dedicated to building science. The new library contains all available materials that focus on creating disaster-resistant communities.
Climate Central: Visualize Sea Level Rise with Climate Central's New Tools
Climate Central has released new visual tools to communicate the risk rising seas pose to locations across the globe. See which locations we can save by cutting carbon pollution. Check out the associated maps and report.
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Natural Hazards Center: Moving Research Into Action – Tools for Practitioners
Making research actionable and accessible to emergency managers and others in the field is crucial to helping communities during disasters. The Natural Hazards Center recently compiled a collection of their work in this area that could be useful to practitioners and policy makers. Please visit the Research to Practice Publication collection for recent findings on topics such as school safety, landslides, risk communication, vulnerable populations, and more. And check back often—this living collection will continue to grow.
CSEPP: Emergency Preparedness Tips for Access and Functional Needs Groups
During a disaster, individuals with disabilities and others with access and functional needs may require special assistance from first responders. The following six-part series of Preparedness Tips was developed to help the whole community enhance its personal level of preparedness.
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FEMA: New Tool from FEMA Provides Access to Hazus-Related Products
FEMA has released the Hazus Loss Library, an online collection of risk assessment information for planners and emergency managers to search, view and download Hazus-generated risk information. Hazus, FEMA’s loss estimation software, provides standardized tools and data for estimating risk from hazards. It also provides information on physical damage, economic impacts, social impacts and cost effectiveness. The Hazus Loss Library is a collection of products that includes modeling for flood, hurricane, earthquake and tsunami events across the country.
FEMA created the Hazus Loss Library to make measurable risk information accessible to the nation. The Hazus Loss Library will support all phases of emergency management at the local, state and federal levels. Specifically, it can support risk assessments in mitigation plans; identify where to focus resources and program benefits in emergency management; provide losses-avoided studies for mitigation grants; and more.
The application is free and easy to navigate for both technical and non-technical users. Visit https://hazards.fema.gov/hll to view the library and find the risk information available for your community.
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 FEMA Releases Second Coloring Book in the “Safer Communities” Coloring Book Series: “My Safe Yard”
FEMA recently released the “My Safe Yard” coloring book to teach young children (primarily ages 4 to 7) about how preparing their yard for a storm can make their home safer.
This 11-page book, which is available in English and Spanish, includes a short narrative about a family becoming storm safety superheroes by preparing their yard for a storm, a glossary of terms to help expand vocabulary, and activities that can be done with an adult.
The book is the second in the “Safer Communities” series, which showcases different methods to mitigate the effects of natural hazards in communities.
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 Climigration Network: Lead with Listening - A Guidebook for Community Conversations on Climate Migration
This guidebook helps practitioners engage with historically disadvantaged communities facing difficult questions as to what to do and where they should go in the face of intensifying climate impacts. This resource is especially useful in informing agency and local buyout conversations.
For more information, please contact Climigration Network Narrative Working Group co-chairs Hannah Teicher or Patrick Marchman.
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 Book Announcement: Global Views on Climate Relocation and Social Justice
As the effects of climate change become more severe and widespread, there is a growing conversation about when, where and how people will move. Climate relocation is a controversial adaptation strategy, yet the process can also offer opportunity and hope. This collection grapples with the environmental and social justice dimensions, with cases drawn from Africa, Asia, Australia, Oceania, South America, and North America. The contributions throughout present unique perspectives, including community organizations, adaptation practitioners, geographers, lawyers, and landscape architects, reflecting on the potential harms and opportunities of climate-induced relocation.
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