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I'm at home with covid, so I interviewed my husband, a computer programmer who works remotely, but who has spent his whole life in the Adirondacks. His particular areas of concern were lack of winter, backcountry safety, ecosystem threats and changing habitats, flooding and infrastructure, and housing for locals, climate migrants, and refugees. We talk about climate change as a family and with all our scientist friends all the time, but the particular questions about communicating and planning made me realize, that from his "average citizen" perspective, there is VERY little climate communication and planning from agencies and organizations in our area (with the exception of The Wild Center and certain key others). So eye-opening to hear the perspective of a well-informed, well-connected person who is nonetheless kind of befuddled as to what the message is for our region.

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Opportunities for audiences to play with models

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Opportunities for audiences to play with models

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I think it would be awesome to have a big screen where audiences could play with scenarios in models and SOLUTIONS to those scenarios. Clicking around on NASA's sea level rise tool, I got curious about Nantucket and came across this article, where students used modelling tools to look at how human modifications to the island had caused problems to hydrogeomorphology, but could also be used to engineer solutions.

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Nantucket offers a vivid illustration of the principle of flux, the idea that everything is in a constant state of becoming. There is a powerfully optimistic sense to this ancient Greek concept: on one hand, steady change begets stability-think of a river or an organism, which is never quite the same from one moment to the next, yet it resolutely maintains its identity-and on the other, "becoming" suggests possibility, improvement, and innovation. Lately, we have become accustomed to viewing change with trepidation: climate change, especially, offers fearsome potential for catastrophe. Warmer temperatures and rising oceans will alter Nantucket, possibly inundating its beaches, its historic town center, and other low-lying areas across the island.

A recent survey of Nantucketers revealed that over 70 percent are "very worried" about climate change. However, the Envision Resilience Nantucket Challenge organized by ReMain Nantucket calls for a sense of confidence in the face of change. It "seeks to inspire the community to imagine a future that is adaptive in the face of sea level rise." Over the last year, ReMain Nantucket has brought together island residents, scientists, business leaders, artists, and preservationists to advise graduate students and faculty from five different US design programs, including a group from the Harvard GSD led by Professor Chris Reed, as they considered the possibilities for long-term change on Nantucket.

Nantucket took shape through the unhurried dynamism of earth's geological transformations. Twenty-five thousand years ago, the slowly advancing Laurentide ice sheet pushed huge piles of soil and gravel southward, forming irregular glacial moraines south of Cape Cod. The ice retreated, sea levels rose, and erosion beat down the low hills to form Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket, and the Elizabeth Islands. The earliest settlers on Nantucket walked there from the mainland before the Atlantic gradually surged up around it. Some 10,000 years before Greek philosopher Heracleitus first wrote about the concept of flux, the Wampanoag people benefited from change on the island, taking advantage of its seasonal abundance of food. They fished on the windswept shore during the summer and retreated to more protected inland areas to hunt and harvest cranberries in the winter.

European settlers on Nantucket from the 1640s on carried with them a very different understanding of change and land tenure, fixing property boundaries and building more permanent settlements. Although their fortified harbors, sturdy wooden buildings, and well-established infrastructure offered a degree of stability over the last four centuries, natural flows of water, wind, and time have continually enforced the inevitability of change. The island's first harbor silted up in the late 18th century, requiring the main town to move two miles to a new harbor. A hundred years of whaling enriched the island, but a devastating whale oil fire, another silted harbor, and the distant civil war sent Nantucket into decline. The whalers and other settlers drifted away, although a diminishing fishing industry persisted. Beginning in the 1950s, tourism shifted the island's economy again, bringing wealthy property owners and visitors and as well as a diverse population of seasonal and full-time service workers.

Global climate change will affect this current version of Nantucket, but the crucial question is whether sea level rise, altered ocean currents, and unfamiliar weather patterns will bring catastrophe or a new becoming for the island. Reed's spring semester Landscape Architecture studio, "Away. . . Offshore. . . Adrift. . . Shifting Landscapes, Unstable Futures," delved deeply into this question. Although it carefully addressed the Envision Resilience Nantucket Challenge, the studio considered the consequences and possibilities of change even more broadly, both in the context of the island, and with a view toward other maritime localities that must also respond to climate change. Reed and his 10 students examined the natural and human drivers of change, in order to understand their entanglements and their mutually reinforcing influences on the island.

In the initial research portion of the studio, "Migrations," Reed proposed that "climate change and human practices are already having significant impacts on the island, eroding bluffs and collapsing houses, flooding critical infrastructures and streets around downtown and the port, impacting the quality of the natural environment and its ability to sustain habitat and ecological life." To understand these circumstances more fully, students undertook research in five different areas-earth, water flows, ecologies, people, and land tenure-"within a broader frame of glacial, hydrologic, ecological, and social change over longer periods of time."

Part of the goal of this first phase, Reed explains, was to avoid merely responding to the crisis at hand-to "the set of now conditions"-so they could account for "the bigger forces that are in play." Using software to model the flows of water, for example, the students were able to understand present-day mechanisms of erosion and sedimentation within the much longer processes of constant change that have shaped the island from the beginning. They could then speculate on how these flows might continue to alter Nantucket's shorelines. In particular, Reed points out, students could envision how human efforts, such as the creation of groins, jetties, and artificial islands, or the dredging of harbors, have contributed to natural geological alterations of the island. Modeling provided crucial insights into the problems these devices have caused, but also showed how they might be used creatively to help mitigate or even capitalize on long-term effects of climate change.

Research into social changes on the island yielded other insights, recalling, for example, the "light touch" of Indigenous modes of seasonal land use, in contrast to European settlers' more fixed approaches to settlement on the island. The students investigating people and land tenure on Nantucket also uncovered the diverse stories of an island disconnected in crucial ways from mainland culture-of the Wampanoag settlers-"People of the First Light," of enslaved people who had escaped their oppressors and found refuge on the island, of generations of prominent Black landowners and whalers who prospered there, and more recently of a large number of people from all over the world who provide seasonal labor.

In phase two of the studio, "Shifting Grounds," students continued their research with what Reed calls "performative speculations." These exercises "introduce a physical design component," Reed explains, and get the students "to deal with materials, physical things and physical forms within a constantly changing and dynamic environment." Digital simulations in this phase of the studio helped students look at "the physical and the temporal, and the mutual effects between them, so that they are designing with these forces in mind." They investigated ways, for example, that installation of fences or piles on a vulnerable shoreline might help control beach erosion and encourage dune deposition, or how chains, nets, and other small structures anchored in shallow tidal areas would channel flows of water and sediment to make shore areas more productive for sea life, or how houses might be anchored against the attrition of coastal bluffs.

During the final phase of the studio, "Provisional (Re-)occupations," the students carried this research into designs for specific sites on the island. In focusing on the vulnerable areas identified by Envision Nantucket-Brant Point, downtown, and Washington street-students developed extensive long-term proposals that could take advantage of sea level rise and shifts in tidal currents to improve habitats and accommodate evolving public interests. But Reed explains that he wanted these proposals "to go beyond the brief that Envision had given us, which was very much focused on the inner harbor and the downtown," in order to address more comprehensive climatic and social issues that affect the whole island. So students also proposed long-term protections for and reconfiguration of other important places on the island-the collapsing bluffs on the North Shore and the barrier beach of Coatue peninsula.

The benefit of going beyond the brief in their proposals, Reed argues, was that "because we stepped so far back to look at some of the formational processes in a bigger geography [the students] were able to say 'we can actually address a whole bunch of potentially bigger problems by acting out here, than by acting locally.'" The resulting designs proposed sometimes subtle, sometimes dramatic adjustments to the island's shorelines that would allow Nantucket to evolve productively while sustaining the fundamental identities of the island and its communities.

Although climate change is a developing crisis-a widespread disaster of our own making-this studio extended from a sense of optimism about change. From the outset, "Away. . . Offshore. . . Adrift. . . Shifting Landscapes, Unstable Futures" accepted that Nantucket is in flux-as it always has been. Climate change became the inspiration for long-term designs to build more plentiful habitats and fisheries, more protective shorelines, and more resilient and flexible communities. In the face of malevolent change, of potential catastrophe, the studio instead envisioned powerful new ways of becoming for Nantucket.

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An Island in Flux: Envisioning a more resilient Nantucket

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Nantucket offers a vivid illustration of the principle of flux, the idea that everything is in a constant state of becoming. There is a powerfully

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In case others were wondering about the widespread fires in Central Africa https://modis.gsfc.nasa.gov/gallery/individual.php?db_date=2022-06-24

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For my power of a picture I chose the Yellowstone National Park - Old Faithful Geyser! It's not only an active geyser but it truly is a work of art. Most recently the geyser erupted spewing tons of steam into the air and this shows the way nature really works in really "letting off steam" like we do. I use this comparison and picture to show that the power of a picture is also the power we have within ourselves to let off some steam and learn or create new experiences as we are with this course for many of us!

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I studied the current Wildfires burning in the Jasper National Park and slowly spreading across parts of Canada and the US. I choose to focus in Alberta Canada due to the population size being relatively small and to show the approximately position of the fires vs where human population has settled.

I also played around with the sea level rise and vulnerability for the Southern US border from Texas to here in Florida on the NOAA Map https://coast.noaa.gov/slr/#/layer/vul-soc/0/-10191061.428796653/3580428.470954998/7/satellite/40/1/2050/interHigh/midAccretion

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In the past I got to work as an Educator and teach on the banks of the Elwha river post dam removal. It was one of the most powerful locations that I have gotten the opportunity to teach in. I used a lot of before and after pictures to illustrate the enormity of the project for students

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I've lined up two interviews with subject matter experts on shoreline restoration and resiliency for Wallops Flight Facility, which is partially located on a barrier island on the Eastern Shore of Virginia. Sea Level Rise is a great concern for our community (residents, visitors, and investors/stakeholders in Wallops), and I can't wait to explore the topic with local subject matter experts! I also have a lead on an environmental engineer focusing on restoring habitats and ecosystems after impacts from historic base operations and actions.

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I interviewed my Public Affairs counterpart, who is over Oklahoma for us. This person also lives there, so naturally, drought and fire were the focus of our conversation. Farming is becoming increasingly expensive (hay pricing) and challenging (lack of water). We were able to talk about that in some detail since I have a friend who is a rancher in the area and tells me about how things are getting harder. Oklahoma is a state that requires fire to maintain grasslands and keep them from becoming cross-timber forests. Being that this person is also on our Grasslands Initiative Team, talking about how to benefit from fire while limiting the negatives was interesting. Living in a political environment that historically doesn't take climate change seriously has made it difficult to tackle some of the everyday problems, so we also talked about that.

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I played around with the NOAA Sea Level tool and the NASA Sea Level tools. For NOAA; Seeing the photo with a 'flooded' road and the blue show up when you I feel like really showcase how serious sea level rise can be.

I liked seeing a spot that was actually in FFXCO, so I can see myself using this tool when we chat about sea level rise affecting the Potomac River. And the vulnerability index on the NOAA tool was good to see looked similar to FFX's vulnerability index.

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I talked to Steve Whitaker, Channel Islands National Park's intertidal ecologist, about how climate change is impacting our intertidal ecosystems (I actually interviewed Steve and other park specialists a little while ago for a series of climate webpages for the park, so it was serendipitous timing to receive this assignment).

As sea level rises, Steve said he expects intertidal communities to shift up the shoreline, with organisms lower along the intertidal gradient moving higher. In areas bordered by sea cliffs, a ‘crunch’ may occur where organisms run out of shoreline in which to shift, potentially reducing the abundance and diversity of those intertidal communities.

However, increased erosion due to climate change may increase the amount of suitable habitat for rocky intertidal communities in other island locations, potentially allowing those communities to expand. Steve leads our long term monitoring efforts for rocky intertidal habitats, and he and his team are actively monitoring the effects of climate changes on intertidal communities to learn more about how the intertidal will respond to these forces.

Specifically, something that came up in the interview that didn't make it to the webpage was the impact on rockweed. Rockweed is an algae that is a foundational species for intertidal ecosystems, providing food and habitat for many other species. Santa Ana winds (warm east winds that make their way out to the islands periodically) have a negative impact on rockweed abundance. Some climate models are predicting more frequent santa anas, while others are less conclusive.

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ochre star splashed black rock SRI 2023 square

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At the center I work at we have redesigned our exhibit hall and one of the new exhibits will have some local before and after pictures. I think those sort of pictures especially when relevant to someone locally carry a lot of weight. I liked looking at the Images of Change as well as using the other tools. After delving into a subject with a group a good image is made even more powerful!

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Where I work, we are installing chronologs for students to document what they see at our park. We talk a lot about individual and collective action and will display photos showing the trees planted / invasives removed by students over time at the park to help young people envision their impact. I would love a curtain slider feature for our digital representation!

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I was amazed at how comprehensive the FIRMS tool is. Here I've highlighted the relatively nearby Chico fire.

I also loved the Images of Change and all the different ways to view the data. In a short amount of time, I experienced hurricane damage, ice melt, tornado paths, dried-up lakes, and a very snowy California.

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Here is a photo I took recently at the 1929 Pardee Dam, which lies across the Mokelumne River. The Pardee Reservoir is the heart of our drinking water supply here in the eastern part of the San Francisco Bay. We were part of the East Bay Municipal Utility District's inaugural Water Academy. We also had the chance to walk up the 300 steps inside the Dam to sign our names on the walls.

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This is the picture that I tried to upload as my ice breaker. Earthrise.  Iconic and it really speaks to me.

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This is the picture that I tried to upload as my ice breaker. Earthrise.  Iconic and it really speaks to me.

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I talked to both the Manager and Assistant Manager of my museum specifically about having this planetarium show as part of my project for this course. I want to also include some info about climate change in our region - the Carolina Piedmont. Both were supportive. One wrote, "Science explained in an easy-to-understand way and solution for everyday people were presented – not just doom and gloom."

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While exploring the Interagency Sea Level Rise Scenario Tool, I was reminded of a group that visited my college over a decade ago. This small group of climate change activists came from the remote Pacific islands of Tuvalu and Kiribati, two nations facing extreme vulnerability to climate change. Rising sea levels will likely render their islands uninhabitable within our lifetime. Loss of ancestral homelands, culture, and tradition are some of the unfortunate casualties of our changing climate that affect real people and impact their daily lives.

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I was particularly moved by the images of glaciers and melting ice caps. This would be a powerful tool to show positive changes as well - the results of restoration efforts, reforestation, and other remedial projects.

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I played a little more with FIRMS and revisited my old favorite LandSat. These tools provide important background information for my interpretation, give me the confidence to introduce them to participants, and are the perfect way to remind people how stinkin' cool NASA is. I like using them to show impacts at our site and then bounce out to our state and beyond. I think it could also be fun to pinpoint a visitor's location for the same kind of zoom-out to reinforce that all climate issues are local first.

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This is a terrific (and mesmerizing) way to make climate impacts tangible. It's easy to get lost in the compelling artistry of some of the images and forget what you're looking at, a weird reminder that even destruction and chaos have an odd sort of beauty.

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Since I don't have a "site", I talked to the EMS lead at the local rescue squad where I volunteer. Even our prelim conversation was great -- we connected over something we both care about but hadn't really discussed more than social content for Earth Day and extreme weather. So that was a win right there. Unfortunately, our official chat has been delayed because we (yet another) flash flood event yesterday and a tree fell, knocking out power to the station, so he's been focused on other things for the moment. (We have generators for key areas of the station, but it's still a drag.) The pic is the intermittent stream in my front yard during our call.

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On the ETS Virtual Course Action Plan Worksheet, several items have asterisks, I didn't see a corresponding note.

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Interview worksheet - a keeper for the toolbox

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Interview worksheet - a keeper for the toolbox

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The Interview sheet our ETS friends have provided is a great beginning discussion and planning guide. I am feeling like when we hold workshops in our own regions, we could use this Interview sheet for a kind of "next level" engagement with stakeholders who are very ready to roll up their sleeves. This interview sheet is a great set of questions for any organization to begin to incorporate (or enhance existing) climate foci into their planning.

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My interview with our Warm Springs National Fish Hatchery Manger was very interesting. Warming water temperatures and the way the river recharges (more rain vs snow melt) has become an animal welfare issue necessitating trucking their juvenile fish to a sister hatchery with colder summer water temperatures. The fish are then trucked back in the fall (when the water is cooler) to the Warm Springs river so they will imprint on this river and return to it as adults.

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I spent some time looking at sea surface rise in the places I've called home throughout my life. The marsh migration feature was especially interesting (for me, at least): the rapid transition of the Elk River from emergent wetland to transitional and saltwater marsh was fascinating.

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Interviewee: James, new Ops Manager, former Security Supervisor. His desired focus is on helping inner-city youth.

Facility Context: We are an 86-acre urban nature center in New Orleans East (a marginalized part of town) dedicated to preserving native habitats and educating the public on the wonders of the natural world. It should be noted that our structures and most of our forest, along with nearly everything else in our immediate geographic area, was decimated by the storm surge and subsequent storm protection system failure following Hurricane Katrina on 29AUG05. We were rebuilt using FEMA funding but that process took over a decade when the facility was entirely closed to the public.

James is a Gen-Z’er from a conservative family with a mass media based knowledge of GCC. He stays away from conversations on the topic because he believes there is too much hate and “vitriol” on “both sides”. His take on GCC's effects at our facility are (short-range) observational and based on living in the area for two decades.

James believes there has been a “blow up in invasive species within the last decade” as well as a significant shift in the species composition of our waterways which he recognises as crucial to many ways of life in southeast Louisiana. While this summer is something more akin to ‘normal’, we had exceptional drought and heat last summer which James believes caused a “lot of death”. Whereas cyclical changes are viewed as normal, James believes there is “too much stress in the extremes”. The perceived outcome of this is we cannot give our visitors a “window to what natural habitat should look like” because GCC is responsible for creating “unnatural habitat”.

Hurricanes are never far from anyone’s mind here, especially this time of year. It’s no surprise that his belief is GCC and hurricane frequency are “intrinsically” connected. While severe weather events are certainly a lot to think about, there was no other recognition of potential threats beyond.

Interestingly, James believes our facility specifically has a comms plan regarding GCC. Everything he told me was material I had assembled in conjunction with our first foray into such messaging in conjunction with a planetarium program we began in June of this year. James acknowledges our larger parent organization has a well-conceived an hurricane plan and thinks the institute of which we are apart hasn’t yet gauged threat beyond that. We don't have a climate change plan or messaging, yet.

For mitigation, adaptation, and communications, James would like to see us educate the public in a way that way that we communicate there is a problem to be "solved" while clearly expressing the public themselves are not the problem. He thinks we should reduce waste and minimise energy consumption at the individual level and was not aware of the impact of larger-scale industrial and agricultural contributions. We are a very small team with a lot of land to steward, and James feels the aforementioned increase in invasive species as a direct result of GCC is a significant challenge to him in his new role as operations manager as we simply do not have the person power to be able to keep up most of the time.

James firmly believes we need to start at the level of our local community to reveal what sorts of climate change problems they are having locally. He advocates using local universities, especially LSU which is in Baton Rouge, about an hour away, to see how they are “formatting their messaging for the younger crowd”. He does not see any value in communicating science-based information, instead wanting to focus on a “solutions oriented five to ten year plan”. I found the “five to ten year” timeframe interesting because, to me, it implies we can “solve” climate change problems based solely on local input and in a short period of time.

Many of the informed population here in south Louisiana are aware of the Coastal Master Plan and Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority. James was not. He indicated he would source peer reviewed papers from academic databases for climate science information, but earlier on indicated what he knows is near entirely from media reports and conversations among coworkers.

Ultimately, James believes we must work with schools to educate youth to keep climate change objective and help them understand this is the future of the “entire world”. New Orleans has long been accurately using the term resiliency and there is no doubt our nature center’s re-emergence from a severe weather destruction is a powerful message. James feels humans have “an extraordinary ability to adapt” and “hold dominion” which will result in “saving our home for ourselves.”

His closing statement was amazing: "How hospitable is this rock going to be?"

Overall Thoughts:

Hurricane thinking is very deeply embedded in the consciousness of New Orleanians. There might not be much knowledge of sea level rise and extreme heat risk which are perhaps the other two most significant impacts of GCC in south Louisiana. Hurricanes are a lot of stress on their own, so how can we bring awareness to other risks without overburdening folks?

Wanting to solve local problems for local people is certainly admirable but there was no mention of collaboration outside of our immediate area.

Based on previous ad-hoc conversations, I know this interviewee’s responses were significantly different from those I might have heard from anyone else. They were more anthropocentric than the others might have been and while inclusivity and social justice should always be woven into what we do, I’m not sure how we can do that while staying on our basic mission which is habitats and education about those habitats… not solving specifically human problems.

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I am also in the position of not being at a “site,” but rather a facility. I sat down for a lightning quick chat with my colleague, Wilson, who is the Youth Volunteer Coordinator at PDZA. Before coming to PDZA, their career was in outdoor environmental education, with a focus on climate change and forestry.

A recurring topic in our discussion was the big, looming volcano on the horizon: Mount Rainier/Tahoma. We are heavily reliant on water in the PNW; what happens when there’s no more meltwater entering the sound? When there are no longer glaciers on the mountain?

Through our discussion, we also realized that there’s a lot about our facility that we simply don’t know. For instance, how plans/strategies do our animal care staff have in place for continuing to care for animals that are sensitive to high heat? Will there be trouble sourcing food for some of our animals?

We ended our chat with more questions than answers, but I plan to return to these interview questions in future team meetings.

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I took the liberty of interviewing our Sustainability and Resilience Administrator to directly get her views on the topic.

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ETS Virtual Course Interview Worksheet ANSWERS

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Interview with Hannibal Parks & Rec Media and Outreach Director

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Interview with Hannibal Parks & Rec Media and Outreach Director

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I spoke with Mary Lynne Richards, my direct supervisor at Hannibal Parks and Rec. She and I work well together and our relationship is one of collaboration as we decide on which programs to offer each month. We talked about what we think we know about Climate Change, how it affects our local community, and the attitudes surrounding it. We are both on the same page in regards to our feelings about Climate Change and know it's affecting our local community here in Hannibal and up and down the river. When the Mississippi floods as it has just this past month, Hannibal feels it economically and socially. Riverboats can't get under the bridges or safely go through locks and dams on the upper Mississippi so they can't dock in Hannibal. During our July 4th Tom Sawyer Days celebration people could not get down to the riverfront because the flood gates were in which also closed off our largest parking lot for downtown making parking much more frustrating for festival goers. The 32 ft flood wall, put in place just before the big flood of 1993, keeps the water from inundating downtown. Tourists don't always know this or believe that Hannibal is still open for business when they hear and see news about the flooding, so will cancel their trips here. Tourism is one of Hannibal's largest income producers so loss of visitors really affects our economy and local businesses.

That said, Mary Lynne says that others in our community also recognize that the frequent flooding that has occurred over the last 20 years could be a result of Climate Change. How many believe it's human caused is a different issue in our politically conservative community, but she thinks more people do understand that human behavior and industry has had an impact on global warming than might let on. Talking about climate change in relation to being human caused is not a subject we discuss around here. As Mary Lynne pointed out, we kinda know who is of a like mind so we don't need to discuss it with them while we avoid such conversations with others who we presume think differently.

Mary Lynne described her understanding of Climate Change as being inadequate to really explain to someone else. She has a general understanding that it's caused by all the Co2 from oil and gas emissions getting trapped in our atmosphere causing the overall temperature of the earth to rise which then causes the extreme weather patterns, the melting of polar ice caps and glaciers leading to sea level rise. Otherwise Mary Lynne feels like she doesn't really understand all the causes and ramifications.

We did talk about doing a program for the community on Climate Change and what that might look like. Would it be an indoor presentation with graphics and video using some of the NASA resources I am learning about, or a walking program down by the river with pictures I might show, or framed as a community discussion? If a community discussion, we might have to get approval or buy in by the Director of Parks and Rec and other city officials so as not to add to internal city conflicts. Any kind of program about climate change feels risky but necessary for both of us. Whatever we do, we don't want it to all be about doom and gloom. We want people to have more understanding but also feel empowered with simple action steps they can take and that's there's hope.

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I had the privilege of interviewing Elizabeth Tucker, a retired supervisor of Rosie the Riveter WWII Historical Park. Elizabeth, the park's third Supervisor, played a pivotal role in creating the Visitor Center, many of its permanent displays, and education programs. Her dedication and vision have left an indelible mark on the Center.

Our discussion first centered around ongoing and future threats to the Visitor Center. Albert Kahn was the architect of the Visitor Center and the Ford Assembly Plant next door. The Center was an oil house that delivered the oil from large tanks in the building through a tunnel. With King tides and other surges, the tunnel is often the source of water intrusion at the lower level, which houses our theater, classrooms, restrooms, and offices. Because we face the Bay, we also often deal with damage from the marine environment. Next to the Center is an empty lot polluted with many chemicals.

The Visitor Center, a place of historical significance, is well-placed to discuss climate change. Richmond, where the Center is located, was part of a complex challenge encompassing a large part of the world during WWII. Our Navy was severely damaged following the Pearl Harbor attack, and we didn't have a significant Army following WWI. However, that quickly changed as many Americans signed up to fight. Businesses pivoted to provide goods and services for the war; for example, just down the street from Rosie, a bathtub company built bombs. This historical context gives the Visitor Center a unique perspective on the societal changes brought about by the war.

Most of the positions that men had filled were now empty. Congress passed two pieces of legislation: equal pay for equal work and non-discrimination in military contracting jobs. Women and people of color answered the call. The whole country was on the move. Here in Richmond, women built 747 ships at these shipyards. Next door at the Ford Assembly Plant, the women equipped over 66,000 vehicles, including tanks and jeeps. Women duplicated these efforts across the country. When faced with an existential threat, everyone came together.

The curriculum for our Every Kid Outdoors combines the history of WWII and climate change with an emphasis on hope, using the success of WWII. Many of the children haven't heard of climate change. Rangers and Docents use this as an opportunity to explain basic science, such as how greenhouse gases raise the temperature of Earth. Rangers even use a blanket to cover a basketball.

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Hi! I interviewed the director of the Office of Environmental and Energy Coordination of Fairfax County, effectively the climate office of the county.

Since this is the office I work in - a lot of the answers he gave were ones I resonated with. Like the local changes caused by climate change being shifting temps, "he's been here for 40 years, and he notices shifting seasons, it's slight and subtle but the spring is coming earlier and mild weather" and that the threat to our county's resources are "since the extremes are more extreme, manpower will be stretched thin. as well as a recent combo of recent drought combined with recent heat wave led to an algae bloom/growth on the Potomac River (author note - I didn't know this happened) was a threat because the whole region depends on the river for our fresh waste supply,.. even more noticeable to people in the area because the water treatment plant in Herndon had to treat the water extra hard, and when they dispelled the wastewater, it had an odor. Lots of complaints and lots of work to fix it!"

When I asked him about how our county's stories are affected by climate change, he mentioned that "climate change and the disruption it causes, amplifies the gap between wealth statuses..", something our office focuses on trying to mitigate.

And finally, at the end, his answer for what makes you hopeful: "People and societies can adapt, we can't change the climate on a dime, everything happening now has been set in motion for 100 years. People can adapt and play with the hand they've been dealt. There is a large human capacity for adaptation. We've been [unknowingly] making our living situation worse with 150 years of industrialization but hopefully we see the signs that we can adapt to it, designing buildings and processes for the changing climate. The same way that human transformations that have always happened, like photos of NYC streets in 1905 were full of horse drawn carts and in 1915 the same streets full of gas cars."

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During this summer of persistent extreme heat, Fairfax County's Office of Environmental and Energy Coordination (OEEC) and a network of interagency partners, local non-profits, generous residents, and volunteers, worked together to bring relief to residents of Harmony Place Mobile Home Park who were without sufficient air conditioning (AC), or no AC at all. This effort to "fill the gap" and enhance access to extreme heat-related services is in alignment with the county's Resilient Fairfax Plan. Extreme heat is the "silent killer," and the leading cause of weather-related fatalities in the United States, far outpacing all others. The county administers federally-funded cooling programs that provide financial assistance and cooling equipment repair and installation for eligible residents. To check eligibility and apply for Energy Assistance, visit CommonHelp.org or call 1-833-522-5582. Due to the eligibility criteria for these federal programs, there are residents who do not qualify due to income, age, disability status, or other factors, but would benefit from additional energy assistance. A few examples of families in this situation included: A family with a child whose trailer was over 100 degrees inside on a hot day. A family with a pregnant mother and her children who were without AC for over a year. An adult male who had no AC at all at home. Within just a few days of being notified of the urgent situation at Harmony Place, government and non-profit partners across the county came together to create an innovative pilot project to provide window and portable AC units to these families. In partnership with local advocacy groups like United Community and Tenants and Workers United, county staff were able to connect with residents and assess their homes for cooling and other basic needs. The Department of Family Services accepted referrals for those who potentially qualified for existing services. Faith Alliance for Climate Solutions rallied its member congregations to donate some of the AC units. Additional supplies and financial donations were made by community members who felt compelled to help. Members of Daniels Run Peace Church stepped up to collect and transport AC units, fund critical electrical fixes, and provide additional Spanish translation. And staff from Hybla Valley Community Center graciously stored the units. Local nonprofit Rebuilding Together stepped up to conduct electrical inspections, order additional supplies, install the units, and make other critical life-safety repairs, despite a current funding gap. The organization mobilized more than a dozen volunteers to help over a five-day period. Social workers from the county's Coordinated Services Planning joined OEEC on site to connect residents to other critical needs such as food, clothing, transportation, and childcare. The Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) ensured alignment between this effort and other ongoing mobile home park efforts. The Office of Public Affairs provided rapid help with translation services. Additional informational resources for the residents were sent to the site by the Department of Emergency Management and Security, Department of Public Works and Environmental Services, Health Department, Neighborhood and Community Services, and One Fairfax. OEEC led and managed the initiative, organizing these logistics and connecting all partners. This human-centered work serves and supports our most vulnerable residents, advances healthy communities, and improves housing and neighborhood livability - all important elements of the Countywide Strategic Plan. This work shows the importance of community collaboration and effective government agencies working together. As of July 30, a total of 16 homes have received AC help and other critical repairs at Harmony Place, which is located in the Franconia District along the Route 1 Corridor. An additional 9 homes are ready and scheduled for installation, 2 homes are in the electrical evaluation phase, and other homes are being referred for larger HVAC or electrical upgrades. Additionally, OEEC is coordinating with nonprofit Community Housing Partners on energy efficiency upgrades for several of the homes. Special thanks to Franconia District Supervisor Rodney L. Lusk and his staff for their support and assistance. To further help its manufactured housing communities (MHCs), the county has applied for a $39.5 million federal grant called the Preservation and Reinvestment Initiative for Community Enhancement (PRICE) Main Competition from U.S. Housing and Urban Development. If awarded, the county will use the funding for flooding, heat, and wind resilience strategies, infrastructure upgrades, and other services to help improve the quality of life for some of the most vulnerable in our community.

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Office of Environmental and Energy Coordination

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Fairfax County, Virginia - The latest news and resources from the Office of Environmental and Energy Coordination.