Climate report encourages increased coordination to make resilient communities

SAN DIEGO – A team of experts recommend increased effort, coordination and engagement by San Diego agencies and researchers to build climate resilience with attention to disadvantaged communities that are particularly susceptible to climate change impacts, according to a report released July 1.

The authors, representing the American Planning Association and Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, released “Collaborative Planning for Climate Resilience,'' that analyzed the planning needed to address climate change impacts in the San Diego region.

“We have many agencies at different levels of government responsible for various aspects of climate change planning – from individual cities to regional agencies like SANDAG and the County Water Authority to state agencies like the Governor's Office of Emergency Services,'' said Robert Leiter, previously director of planning and land use for the San Diego Association of Governments. “Our report analyzes those activities and provides a framework for how agencies can coordinate more effectively in developing plans to enable this region to adapt to and recover from the increasingly intense impacts which we face from climate change.''

According to the report, the San Diego region is susceptible to a host of threats to its quality of life and the natural environment because of climate change. The threats include more intense heat waves, sea-level rise, mounting wildfire hazards and increased threats from severe winter storms. The result will be major impacts on our infrastructure, natural resources, coastal resources, and public health and safety. These threats take on a special urgency for disadvantaged environmental justice communities that are particularly vulnerable to these impacts.

Although climate adaptation and resilience planning are already underway in San Diego, it is becoming increasingly important to design these efforts in ways that bring scientists, planners, practitioners and community representatives together in planning processes, the authors found. A collaborative approach leads to science-based and cost-effective strategies and actions which can be implemented in a timely manner. It is also increasingly important to compare the costs and benefits of various strategies, and to ensure that adequate funding is available to implement necessary actions, they found.

By relying on an overall framework for climate resilience planning that utilizes existing regional plans and local government general plans, the public agencies in the San Diego region can more effectively meet the challenges we are facing, while at the same time updating and refining plans in ways that can meet other important goals and objectives. In doing so, it illustrates how the special needs of historically disadvantaged communities, including communities of color, low-income communities, tribal communities and certain rural areas can be effectively addressed.

The report “illustrates the importance of making the region more resilient in the face of those impacts and describes how local, regional and state agencies and institutions must coordinate their efforts to accomplish this important goal,'' said Scripps Oceanography climate scientist and co-lead author Julie Kalansky.

The full report can be read at https://cnap.ucsd.edu/2021/06/30/collaborative-planning-for-climate-resilience/.

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