Resilient Virginia’s Spring 2024 Resiliency Academy “virtual series will highlight available tools and resources that communities can use to integrate climate into their Hazard Mitigation Plans and other planning efforts.” It takes place from March to June ― March 26, April 30, May 28, and June 18 ― and participation is free.
Registration is required and will open soon.
About Session 1, Understanding Climate in Virginia:
In the first session of the series, we will get acquainted with future climate projections for Virginia. Jeremy Hoffman, Director of Climate Justice and Impact at Groundwork USA and lead author of the Southeast Chapter of the 5th National Climate Assessment, will present a summary of the most recent projections for this region and additional speakers will discuss how the changing climate will impact their communities. Attendees will leave with a better understanding of how communities across Virginia are going to be impacted by climate change and what they will need to consider in their planning efforts.
Why this series, and particularly the first session, matters: Reslience, and its opposite dependence and inflexibility/rigidity, is relevant to the Northern Neck and other rural communities in the state, precisely because resilience funding and planning typically accrues to urban and suburban areas. Rural areas are less populated, the population less dense, the population is aging, resources of all kinds are limited, and health and social indicators are generally going in the wrong direction at a population level. Planning and public policy decisions are necessary to improving systems and actions which together improve resilience. For example, access to alternative accomodations during a storm/flooding preserves life. Similarly, access to financial resources allows for better and more robust planning and managing a disaster or emergency.