Pillars for Building a More Just and Climate-Resilient Future for All

The increased emphasis on climate adaptation and resilience during the recent 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP28) reflects the growing international attention these topics have gained in the face of increasingly urgent challenges posed by climate change. Exemplified by historic investments in climate mitigation and adaptation efforts through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) and the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), local, state, Tribal, Territorial, federal, and international actors are taking significant steps to ensure that communities can better prepare for and respond to climate-related disasters while addressing systemic and structural inequities that have been baked into our systems. While this focused attention has presented a great opportunity, it has also exposed barriers to meeting equitable adaptation and resilience goals: the need for capacity-building at all scales, the challenges of embedding resilience into existing operations and programs, and the need to ensure that investments directly benefit and enhance the resilience of frontline communities.¹

Following the climate adaptation and resilience-focused discussions held at COP28, the Cadmus climate team has been reflecting on the barriers that our clients face when planning for and implementing strategies to reduce the impacts of climate change, the solutions we help develop to overcome these barriers, and the characteristics that make these solutions successful. The following ‘pillars of success’ recognize the lessons we have learned over decades of helping clients operationalize transformational strategies toward ambitious adaptation and resilience goals.

Embed climate adaptation and resilience into all facets of government, including operations, staffing, funding, and programming. Addressing the impacts of climate change requires a “whole of government” approach that identifies specific ways to integrate climate-ready decision-making into all policies, programs, and projects. This approach has been at the heart of our work with the District of Columbia, where we conducted extensive cross-agency stakeholder engagement to prioritize strategies for the District’s comprehensive climate change adaptation plan (Climate Resilient DC). In partnership with the District Government, we developed an Extreme Heat Adaptation Strategy, assessed a potential flood retrofit program, proposed changes to the District’s flood regulations, and developed Resilient Design Guidelines for municipal officials and developers to evaluate the climate-readiness of local projects. We continue to support the District in its climate adaptation and planning work, including updating its climate projections (in partnership with Two Degrees Adapt) and supporting interagency alignment that realizes the short-, medium-, and long-term visions for a more just and resilient District.

Promote “multiple benefits projects” that account for, and address the intersectionality of, the climate crisis. Climate change is already impacting our communities, and frontline communities are experiencing disproportionate impacts. As an issue area, climate change uniquely illuminates existing inequities across a range of systems baked in by historic and current structural and systemically racist policies that impact frontline communities, including: limited access to and/or poor health care exacerbated by extreme heat events; inadequate housing exacerbated by flooding, wildfires, and other extreme events; and, inadequate and limited access to public transportation that have separated communities and/or impact a community’s ability to evacuate during an extreme event. As highlighted in the release of the FEMA Post-Disaster Guide for Local Officials and Leaders—a project that Cadmus has supported since 2019, developing adaptation and resilience strategies that address the intersectionality of climate change should include: 1) generating a data-informed picture of recovery needs (that recognizes inequities exacerbated by climate hazards); 2) developing a whole community picture of needs and inequities; and, 3) assessing equity status and developing a baseline for measuring progress.

Develop customized adaptation and resilience solutions that address the unique lived experiences, systems, and cultural values of a community. For decades, governments have used a ‘one size fits all approach’ that has failed to meet communities where they are. These programs, funding opportunities, and agency efforts often have not always accounted for the unique lived experiences of community members, the cultural values a community holds, and the specific challenges they are facing which has created additional barriers to prepare for and respond to disasters. As a part of Cadmus’ contract support to the FEMA Mitigation Framework Leadership Group (MitFLG) and the Place-based Task Force (PBTF) , the team has been developing a plan to understand the scope and reach of existing place-based technical assistance efforts across the interagency and eventually better align the ongoing work with broader Administration priorities for resilience. The strategies and policy recommendations identified will support the PBTF’s role in furthering better coordination and alignment with the Thriving Communities Network, Community Disaster Resilience Zones, and other Interagency Working Groups, among many others.

Prioritize deep community participation, use diverse approaches that center community values and resources, and promote power sharing. Community ownership of any initiative, effort, or planning process is critical in order to create transformational change over the long-term. Climate adaptation and resilience efforts require sustained and forward-thinking investments at immediate, short-, mid-, and long-term time scales and community priorities must be at the center of prioritizing those investments. In helping New York State develop its plan to manage the rising risks of extreme heat, Cadmus pioneered a community-first, equity-grounded plan that involved directly engaging with hundreds of community members, community organizations, and state representatives to drive adaptation strategy development. These efforts led to the development of more than 70 adaptation actions directly shaped by community voices that will guide millions of dollars in funding to support community members in preparing for and responding to the impacts of extreme heat. Leveraging existing tools and resources, such as the Spectrum of Community Engagement to Ownership, can help guide approaches to assessing community engagement and ensure strategies continue moving along the spectrum toward community ownership.

Define clear metrics for success, embed those metrics into agency/organizational reporting, and ensure continuous improvement. Developing and publishing a climate adaptation and resilience plan takes a committed team, strong coordination, leadership support, and robust visioning. But implementing that plan, tracking progress, and measuring success takes dedicated funding, leadership support, and sustained effort that transcends administrations, funding cycles, and program lifecycles. Developing clear metrics for success for climate adaptation and resilience strategies is critical to meet science- and data-informed timelines, align agency priorities, and leverage funding and programmatic opportunities across any system. Clear metrics and systems to track progress also improves the effectiveness and efficiency of large-scale efforts, supports continuous improvement, and can embed measuring success into government operations and reporting to ensure that leadership and staff are bought into the process. In support of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Creating Resilient Water Utilities (CRWU) initiative, our team has supported water utilities across the country in developing individual climate change risk assessments to better prepare for climate-related hazards. By developing clear metrics for success (as well as specific actions to enhance the resilience of a water utility), we have developed a system for tracking and monitoring progress that has allowed for small corrective actions that keep utilities on track over the long-term.

The final agreement from COP28 included several meaningful commitments toward reducing greenhouse gas emissions to mitigate the severity of climate change, including the first explicit call for a global transition away from fossil fuels. Yet the event also marked a recognition that regardless of these mitigation efforts, we are already experiencing the impacts of climate change, and frontline communities across the world are experiencing these impacts most severely. In response, the launch of the COP28 Declaration on Climate, Relief, Recovery, and Peace called for the mobilization of resources and the commitment to dedicated investments that significantly scale up the work that is already being done. It also acknowledged that investment alone cannot achieve this goal—it will require interdisciplinary and localized approaches that promote community ownership, coordination across the government and private sectors, and clear, data-driven systems for measuring and improving outcomes.

Climate change is already impacting communities across the United States, highlighting the urgent need for transformational solutions that help communities prepare for and bounce back from increasingly frequent and severe climate hazards. Adapting and building resilience to a changing climate involves more than just building physical infrastructure to withstand current and future extreme weather events. It requires a comprehensive approach to integrating social, economic, and environmental dimensions into our vision for a better future for all. Climate risk reduction activities (pursued through a broader resilience lens) are an acknowledgement that climate change has measurable and tangible impacts each and every day and that our built, social, and natural environments, both existing (through hazard mitigation) and future (through resilient building codes, managed retreat, etc.) must reflect this reality, regardless of what can be achieved through climate mitigation policies and actions. Building resilient communities means investing in education and healthcare, leveraging economic opportunities, and ensuring access to clean water and sanitation. It means supporting bold and innovative ideas that transform the future for all. It means empowering and centering Black, brown, and Indigenous voices, empowering communities to actively participate in decision-making processes, and empowering communities to define the future that they want to live now and for coming generations. With this, we can pave the way for a more resilient, just, and equitable future for all.

1. Frontline communities – those impacted first and worst by a changing climate – include Black, brown, and Indigenous communities, immigrants, women, older adults, those with disabilities, low-income communities, rural communities, LGBTQIA+ individuals, English as a Second Language (ESL) communities, the unhoused, individuals who are and/or have been in the prison system, those who lack transportation, people who are neurodivergent, religious minorities, those who lack access to television, radio, internet, and/or phone service, among others.