Climate Change and City Hall: What local governments need to consider

1. Climate Change and City Hall: What local governments need to consider Jane Goodman Council Member, City of South Euclid Outreach & Communications Director, Cuyahoga River Community Planning Organization/RAP

2. • What Local Governments Do• What Local Governments Face• How (some) Local Governments Think• Mitigation• Preparation• Adaptation• Communication• Information “My experience in government is that when things are non-controversial and beautifully coordinated, there is not much going on” – John Fitzgerald Kennedy

3. Disclaimer:Generalizations will be made.Your experiences may differ.Any criticism implied or expressed herein is not about you, it’s about those other people.

4. When smart people get frustrated with the actions or inactions of local governments, they should bear in mind:• Climate change may be your full time job, but it’s not for most public officials. • Most public officials have had little or no education or training about climate, geophysics, or sustainability.• The folks who pass the laws are mostly part-timers.• Ignorance is not bliss, and at this time in history it could be fatal.• You elected these people, or elected those who hired them. “I believe there is something out there watching us. Unfortunately, it's the government.” – Woody Allen

5. WHAT LOCAL GOVERNMENTS DO Keep us Safe & Secure – Police, Fire and Emergency Response Provide Services – waste management, snow removal, social services, traffic management, recreation Construct and Maintain infrastructure – roads, bridges, water and sewer, urban forest Plan Land Useand zoning, building and housing policy and inspect for safety and property values Support Quality of Life – laws regulating behavior, businesses, aesthetics; Collect and Expendfunds to support the above activities “…establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity…”

6. WHAT LOCAL GOVERNMENTS FACE PHYSICAL EFFECTS: • milder, wetter winters, more ice storms than snow storms • more extreme weather events, big rain with heavy runoff = flooding • hotter summers, longer stretches of extreme heat • overall drying (evapotranspiration,) more droughts

7. WHAT LOCAL GOVERNMENTS FACE PHYSICAL EFFECTS: • milder, wetter winters, more ice storms than snow storms • more extreme weather events, big rain with heavy runoff = flooding • hotter summers, longer stretches of extreme heat • overall drying (evapotranspiration,) more droughts ECONOMIC EFFECTS: • reduced funding from federal and state sources as money shifts to disaster relief and mega projects • some will gain as property values, business relocations and inmigration rise in “safe” areas, others will lose (coastal and southern cities.)

8. WHAT LOCAL GOVERNMENTS FACE PHYSICAL EFFECTS: • milder, wetter winters, more ice storms than snow storms • more extreme weather events, big rain with heavy runoff = flooding • hotter summers, longer stretches of extreme heat • overall drying (evapotranspiration,) more droughts ECONOMIC EFFECTS: • reduced funding from federal and state sources as money shifts to disaster relief, mega projects • some will gain as property values, business relocations and inmigration rise in “safe” areas, others will lose (coastal and southern cities.) OPERATIONS: • shifts in emphasis and demand for services

9. WHAT LOCAL GOVERNMENTS FACE PHYSICAL EFFECTS: • milder, wetter winters, more ice storms than snow storms • more extreme weather events, big rain with heavy runoff = flooding • hotter summers, longer stretches of extreme heat • overall drying (evapotranspiration,) more droughts ECONOMIC EFFECTS: • reduced funding from federal and state sources as money shifts to disaster relief, mega projects • some will gain as property values, business relocations and inmigration rise in “safe” areas, others will lose (coastal and southern cities.) OPERATIONS: • shifts in emphasis and demand for services CAPACITY: • population shifts • lower lake levels, drier surface & soil affects water availability • more demand for emergency services, power backups, evacs

10. WHAT LOCAL GOVERNMENTS FACE PHYSICAL EFFECTS: • milder, wetter winters, more ice storms than snow storms • more extreme weather events, big rain with heavy runoff = flooding • hotter summers, longer stretches of extreme heat • overall drying (evapotranspiration,) more droughts ECONOMIC EFFECTS: • reduced funding from federal and state sources as money shifts to disaster relief, mega projects • some will gain as property values, business relocations and inmigration rise in “safe” areas, others will lose (coastal and southern cities.) OPERATIONS: • shifts in emphasis and demand for services CAPACITY: • population shifts • lower lake levels, drier surface & soil affects water availability • more demand for emergency services, power backups, evacs PUBLIC PUSHBACK

11. How (some) local governments think The Kübler-Ross Model for Climate Change 1. Denial - It’s a hoax.

12. How (some) local governments think The Kübler-Ross Model for Climate Change Denial - It’s a hoax. Anger - Okay, maybe it’s real but it’s not our fault. So who can we blame?

13. How (some) local governments think The Kübler-Ross Model for Climate Change Denial - It’s a hoax. Anger - Okay, maybe it’s real but it’s not our fault. So who can we blame? Bargaining - Okay, so maybe it’s partly our fault, we’ll need to commission our own study just to be sure, and I promise, if we could just have a little more time we’ll attend to it just as soon as we can.

14. How (some) local governments think The Kübler-Ross Model for Climate Change Denial - It’s a hoax. Anger - Okay, maybe it’s real but it’s not our fault. So who can we blame? Bargaining - Okay, so maybe it’s partly our fault, we’ll need to commission our own study just to be sure, and I promise, if we could just have a little more time we’ll attend to it just as soon as we can. Depression - Well, now it’s too late and too big to do anything about it.

15. How (some) local governments think The Kübler-Ross Model for Climate Change Denial - It’s a hoax. Anger - Okay, maybe it’s real but it’s not our fault. So who can we blame? Bargaining - Okay, so maybe it’s partly our fault, we’ll need to commission our own study just to be sure, and I promise, if we could just have a little more time we’ll attend to it just as soon as we can. Depression - Well, now it’s too late and too big to do anything about it. Acceptance - Oh, all right. I guess we’d better do something.

16. How local governments SHOULD think The Dick Cheney Model for Climate Change “If there's a 1% chance (that Pakistani scientists are helping al-Qaeda build or develop a nuclear weapon), we have to treat it as a certainty in terms of our response. It's not about our analysis ... It's about our response.” Dick Cheney Ron Suskind, The One Percent Doctrine, (New York Simon & Shuster, 2006.)

17. What local governments should do Learn from history Plan with timelines. Involve your stakeholders. All of them. Don’t make things any worse.

18. MITIGATION • CONVERT to non-carbon sources of energy • CONSERVE energy, water, soil and green space • REDUCE greenhouse gas emissions and sequestration of carbon emitted • PLAN LAND USE for previous three objectives, and to create a city that can operate as if it were totally isolated from the world and in survival mode. • IMPLEMENT SUSTAINABLE SYSTEMS e.g. zero waste; closed-loop manufacturing; local energy generation; water storage and quality; local food; reforestation for temperature moderation

19. PREPARATION “In New Orleans the resilience of the city to withstand winds and waves from Katrina was reduced by the loss of wetlands and mangroves around the Gulf shores, and by the inadequate infrastructure provided by the levees. But the main human disaster came about because the transit system was so inadequate that people who did not own a car (around a third of the population) could not evacuate, and the freeways were at capacity due to the number of individuals in cars. No plan for using school buses and other transit vehicles was in place, so those resources were all washed away with the first floods. The transport system was not resilient and it undermined the rest of the urban system, which turned rapidly into social chaos.” Newman, Beatley & Boyer, Resilient Cities, (Island Press, 2009.)

20. PREPARATION • EDUCATION - decision makers and stakeholders • REGIONAL or LOCAL? • RESOURCE ASSESSMENT and PLANNING • RISK ASSESSMENT and DISASTER PLANNING • FUNDING

21. ADAPTATION PHYSICAL conservation • water • energy • building standards • storm water • transportation ECONOMICgrowing sustainable businesses and green industries • collaborative procurement interchangeable pieces, modular systems • local supply chains OPERATIONAL energy efficiency • KISS • flexible work schedules / telecommuting • reduce areas needing to be maintained CAPACITY shelters for short term/small incidents and big disasters; cooling centers • housing, schools and infrastructure that are expandable or shrinkable • recreation

22. INFORMATION COMMUNICATE • Stakeholders • Message • Physical communication networks

23. INNOVATE “The most successful people are those who are good at Plan B.” James Yorke, University of Maryland, defined the mathematical term “chaos.”

24. RESOURCES RECOMMENDED READING Resilient Cities: Responding to Peak Oil and Climate Change, Peter Newman, Timothy Beatley and Heather Boyer Climatopolis: How our cities will thrive in the hotter future, Matthew E. Kahn ONLINE RESOURCES ICLEI - Local Governments for Sustainability • www.iclei.org ICLEI Canada - Changing Climate Guide & Workbook • www.iclei.org/index.php?id=11710 Chicago Climate Action Guide • www.chicagoclimateaction.org Toronto Action Plan • www.toronto.ca/changeisintheair/ YOU CAN REACH JANE GOODMAN at: goodmanj@crcpo.org or 216.241.2414 x610

25. FOCUS The message to take to your local government: You must not get caught up in small scale mitigation efforts like the planting of one tree at city hall or the replacement of the light bulbs at the community center and think that’s enough. We must get to work, seriously and immediately, on adapting to the changes we’re already seeing and on the ones most likely to occur over the coming decades. Thank you.