equitable resiliency planning?
Hi readers! :)
Thank you so much for reading and your interest in Creative Climate Strategies! I’m very excited to share my first newsletter and start a conversation about what equitable resiliency planning really means. And how to do the work.
I set out to write this first post right after Michael Kimmelman’s NYTimes piece, What Does it Mean to Save a Neighborhood, was published and featured on The Daily podcast. That was a month ago, and I’ve since been sitting on complicated thoughts about how to ensure that the outcomes of resilient design, planning, and infrastructure result in more equitable waterfront communities— not the other way around.
For those that didn’t read, the article makes the point/question: Incrementalism is how we think about progress today. The question is, are there other ways to think about it?
My own relationship with this question dates back most acutely to the 2016 election, which coincided with the year I graduated from planning school. Cornell’s City & Regional Planning program prides itself on its equity planning lens (John Forester, recognized as one of the founders of “equity planning,” taught our intro planning class), but one of my earliest experiences in the program now proves to me how ignorant I was about “equity planning” (and racism in America generally).
We were on a trip to Detroit eating charcuterie on one of Frank Lloyd Wright’s custom designed residential properties (bougie yes, incredible also, yes), and everyone was socializing and having a good time, except for two classmates who were off to the side and seemed upset. I walked over and tried to make small talk, asking how they liked the program so far. When they responded that they had just been talking about how disappointed they were about the lack of racial and economic diversity in the program, I got defensive, talking about what a good program it was and how incredible the students and faculty were. My classmates explained further how they were disappointed at how Cornell failed to provide the kind of financial aid that would truly allow for a diverse class, and I defended the program further, saying it was heavily subsidized compared to other Cornell master’s programs.
The fact that I felt like I had to defend an institution that, on its surface, was trying to do the right thing by delivering a progressive anti-racist urban planning education, and took it as an affront to my value in being there, reveals how insecure I was about accepting unknown alternatives that don’t center me. The conversation haunts me to this day, but it reminds me that to be truly progressive, I need to accept that I don’t have all of the answers, and that every institution needs to be challenged until there is justice. This is a way of thinking rather than a finite lesson learned. Every minute, administration, or generation that we delay justice is a moral and societal failing.
So yes, I’m kicking this company newsletter off by sharing a story about my own white supremacy and one of my most shameful moments for a reason! I think working as an equitable resiliency planner, and a good human generally, means accepting the fragility of our own worldviews, and being open– PASSIONATE even– about being proven wrong. That doesn’t mean being spineless– it means not settling for the status quo, just because things get really bad. It means leveraging (a word I hate but it has to be used) climate change, a global pandemic, political dystopia, etc., as opportunities to break from convention in order to imagine drastically different realities.
Plain and not so simple: I think step one of equitable resilience planning is being able to speak truth to power, whether that’s standing up to developers, elected officials, clients, or bosses, when something isn’t just.
The parable of the East Side Coastal Resiliency project, as Kimmelman describes, is that:
Even the most progressive planning efforts still fail vulnerable communities unless radical transparency and creativity are core values.
“Participatory planning” as we know it may not work at the speed of avoiding climate catastrophe. Community engagement needs to be rethought!
With these thoughts in mind, I am fiercely passionate about working with clients who value transparency and creativity when designing resilient infrastructure FOR communities. I want to help my clients deliver science-based waterfront design strategies for housing, infrastructure, and open space that benefits the many, not the few.
When it comes to community engagement, I do not think it is low-income people living in the floodplain’s responsibility to:
Envision technological advances that can protect them from future risks, though public awareness and education is valuable
Put in hours, be exposed to Covid, sacrifice time with family, money for travel, food, etc. – to come to countless community meetings where their input will likely not be used
Support nonprofits, electeds, mayors, or anyone else who does not center lower-income communities of color, and/or marginalized communities, in resilience decision-making
Put stickers on maps on a weekly basis.
I DO think it is the responsibility for planners, architects, engineers, developers, asset managers, insurance brokers, politicians, electeds, corporate sustainability professionals, and anyone else getting paid to climate adaptation or sustainability work to:
Understand and approach each project as unique, context-based, and complex
Do their homework on existing vision plans, priorities, district needs assessments, etc.
Engage flood risk modelers and data experts to translate future risks into design and maintenance plans
Reduce focus on community engagement, increase efforts towards community communications, with transparency, reliability, and translation services for resilient infrastructure projects in their communities
For policy makers and ESG folks: make climate risk disclosures mandatory and accessible for all; the best data shouldn’t be reserved for luxury developments. Mandate risk data access.
Those are just a few thoughts. I’m really curious to hear what you think, if you’re reading this! Let me know in the comments below or send an email to sarah@creativeclimatestrategies.com. Thank you for reading and lending your mind and actions to the cause!
