Building Resilience to Challenges and Disruptions

Increasing resilience to climate hazards through engagement requires different approaches to reach the variety of decision makers along the Gulf of Mexico. The Community Outreach and Strategic Training Resilience Institute (COAST RI) is a Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium (MASGC) program working to engage elected officials, municipal staff, and other coastal leaders to deliver the best available science and policy information to transform learning outcomes from these activities into tangible actions. This program provides participants with the latest information on locally specific resilience-related science, legislation, and planning actions through interactive in-person and virtual trainings. Resilience topics were provided based on needs identified by target audiences and continue to evolve in response to feedback from participants. Thus far, the resilience trainings offered have including business continuity planning for natural disasters, understanding current and future flood risk, current guidelines for resilient building standards, navigation of online resilience tools, severe weather preparedness, nature-based solutions for coastal hazards, and navigation of the Community Rating System.
In this presentation, we will be highlighting the results of the outreach and engagement with training participants across coastal Mississippi and Alabama. Attendees to this presentation will hear about the different engagement methods (webinars, trainings for local government officials) used to maximize audience reach. We will discuss the successes and lessons learned from building connections with municipal stakeholders, providing engaging and relevant resilience information, and addressing the resilience needs of local decision makers. We will also discuss how community leaders have improved their understanding of changing coastal hazards and increased their capability to implement mitigation and adaptive strategies. Additionally, we will explain the importance of offering continuing education credits for planners and floodplain managers and will review the certificate program that serves as an incentive for participants to attend trainings hosted by the COAST RI.

Coastal communities, like Foley, Alabama, face mounting threats from climate change, including rising sea levels, increasing storm frequency, and flooding. These challenges are compounded by population growth and outdated housing infrastructure that is often ill-equipped to withstand the destructive forces of coastal storms. The need for resilient housing solutions has become critical, and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) are essential in developing adaptive strategies to address these challenges. 
GIS technology supports informed decision-making through detailed spatial analysis, risk assessment, and land-use planning, enabling communities to identify high-risk areas and develop tailored resilience strategies. By integrating complex environmental variables, demographic data, and localized factors, GIS facilitates sustainable and adaptive development not only in coastal areas but also in general community planning. 
The Geospatial Education and Outreach (GEO) Project exemplifies the transformative impact of GIS in community planning. This presentation will highlight the GEO Project's work in Foley, Alabama, where GIS was used to conduct a resilient housing risk assessment, fostering collaboration with local stakeholders, and developing adaptive strategies for climate-related challenges. This interactive approach ensures that resilience strategies are community-specific, inclusive, and capable of promoting long-term sustainability and safety in the face of diverse challenges. By highlighting this case study, the presentation will demonstrate the critical role of GIS in building resilient, adaptable, and thriving communities. 

This session explores experiences and lessons learned from a one-year pilot effort providing technical assistance and support to communities in Florida recently designated as Community Disaster Resilience Zones (CDRZ). The CDRZ designation provides geographic focus for financial and technical assistance to communities to plan for and implement resilience projects. Participants include University of Florida Extension faculty from Florida Sea Grant and the Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (IFAS) that served as "navigators" to work with CDRZs in their respective regions and help advance resilience planning and implementation. These navigators have been assisting and supporting communities that overlap or lie within a CDRZ-designated census tract, helping them take advantage of funding and capacity building opportunities. The navigators in Florida have been working with the Geos Institute as well as regional and national partners including the Resilient Cities Catalyst (RCC), Project IN-CORE, navigators in other states, and others to assist communities through direct outreach, education, partnership building, and coordination.

The overall goal of this project is to help each CDRZ community by meeting them where they are and matching them with appropriate resources and technical expertise to secure funding for resilience. According to FEMA's National Risk Index, CDRZ tracts represent some of the most vulnerable communities to natural hazards, exhibiting high risk and relatively low capacity to address resilience from a social, cultural, economic, infrastructural, environmental and/or institutional lens. 

Through the outreach and engagement process, the team is testing strategies and identifying lessons learned in engaging vulnerable communities and assisting them through the steps to resilience. The navigators conducted outreach, provided resources, assessed resilience efforts using national tools and frameworks, and identified ongoing and complementary community efforts. Navigators collected community intake data, connected with technical service providers, participated in cohort trainings with other states, and contributed to measurement frameworks.

This talk will highlight new resources to help communities plan for and respond to inundation events. An update on a new interagency Sea Level Calculator, resources related to implementation of the Federal Flood Risk Management Standard (FFRMS), and highlights from a new national Coastal Inundation Community of Practice will be shared.


The Sea Level Calculator is a new interagency tool that will produce location-specific projections for sea level and flooding, as well as information about current and past conditions. The tool will allow users to create custom information using data, maps, and visualizations. Local governments and others can use this information to make informed decisions about strategic adaptation investments. NOAA, NASA, USGS, DOD, FEMA, and USACE are all involved in the development of this product.


Another new product is the Federal Flood Standard Support Tool, which was developed to help agencies and recipients of federal funding apply the new Federal Flood Risk Management Standard (FFRMS). Executive Order (E.O.) 13690 establishes the FFRMS, creating a new vertical flood elevation and corresponding horizontal area at which actions must be resilient. This new FFRMS floodplain area applies to federally funded new construction, substantial improvement, or actions to address substantial damage to a structure or facility.


A new network for sharing the latest improvements to inundation modeling and information is the Coastal Inundation Community of Practice (CoP). This CoP facilitates peer-to-peer learning, information exchange, and collaborative engagement to advance resilience to coastal flooding. The network provides a variety of in-person and virtual opportunities for members to connect with each other and coastal flooding resources. This talk will share highlights from a recent gathering of the network members in Seattle, Washington.