Climate Survey – State, Local and Tribal Task Force on Climate Change

Climate Resilience and Preparedness Task Force
Tribal Leaders: Chairwoman Karen Diver and Mayor Reggie Joule
Survey for Recommendations

Background

The President’s Climate Preparedness and Resilience Task Force (Task Force) was convened to develop recommendations on how the Federal government can better support local, state and tribal governments in achieving resilience through Disaster Preparedness, Built Systems, Natural Systems and Agriculture, and Community Development and Health.

The Task Force is charged with providing actionable strategies that can be implemented through existing agency authorities which: 1) remove barriers and create incentives and otherwise encourage investments in resilience; 2) provide useful tools and information, including through intergovernmental coordination; and 3) otherwise support state, local and tribal preparedness for resilience to climate change.

Request for Input
The two tribal leaders on the Climate Change Task Force, Chairwoman Karen Diver of the Fond Du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa and Mayor Reggie Joule of Alaska’s Northwest Arctic Borough, are soliciting your input in developing recommendations specific to:
1. disaster recovery and resilience,
2. infrastructure,
3. natural resources and agriculture, and
4. human health and community development.

Please consider contributing to this process with a brief response to the questions presented below and send your response to IndianCountry@who.eop.gov by Tuesday, April 15, 2014.

Consider a challenge you have encountered or an opportunity you have identified relating to climate preparedness planning and efforts to build resilience within one of the 4 topics listed above.

1. Please describe the challenge or opportunity as it pertains to the needs of tribal governments. (Please limit response to 500 words)

2. What specific actions can be taken at the federal level to encourage and support tribal governments in these efforts? (Please limit response to 500 words)

Select the Topic to which this issue most directly relates (check box)*:
☐ Disaster Recovery and Resilience
☐ Built Systems: Transportation, Water, Energy, and Other Infrastructure
☐ Natural Resources and Agriculture
☐ Communities: Human Health and Community Development

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION*
Disaster Recovery and Resilience. Recommendations related to this topic should address catastrophic and non-catastrophic hazards and the overall cycle of disaster mitigation, preparedness, response, and recovery, and how Federal, state, local and tribal policies impact decisions made. Recommendations should consider outcomes that build Federal, State, Local, and Tribal capacity to become resilient to current and future hazards and disasters. Recommendations should relate to proactive planning and preparedness measures that incorporate resilience, as well as post-disaster recovery and rebuilding.
Built Systems: Transportation, Water, Energy, and Other Infrastructure. Recommendations related to this topic should address the required outcomes by considering all built systems, especially transportation, water, and energy. Recommendations should consider 1) all built systems, including interactions between systems and concerns about cascading failures between and among systems; 2) the interaction of built and natural systems, including the use of natural infrastructure to increase resilience; 3) what drives Federal, state, local and tribal decisions on infrastructure investment; and 4) whether Federal, state, local and tribal policies can/should work together to incentivize the private sector to incorporate climate resilience into their decisions.
Natural Resources and Agriculture. Recommendations related to this topic should address impacts on water resources, agriculture, forests, ecosystems, biodiversity, and ecosystem services, as well as the impacts to human communities of changes in these systems. Recommendations should cover all aspects of natural resources and agriculture, especially the interactions and connectivity between these systems and among these systems and human communities and the built environment. Recommendations should also consider long-term strategies to protect and restore natural resources and systems and the ecosystem services they provide and to enhance overall resilience in the face of a changing climate.
Communities: Human Health and Community Development. Recommendations related to this topic should address social resilience and human health, including public health impacts of climate change from both extreme events and slow onset changes. Recommendations should also consider impacts on vulnerable communities and populations and opportunities for building social resilience in communities of all types, sizes, and demographic makeups. Recommendations on this topic should consider how multiple levels of government can work together to build social resilience at the local level and develop long-term strategies for resilient communities.