By Jeff Schlegelmilch, Deputy Director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University’s Earth Institute and Irwin Redlener, Director at the NCDP and Professor of Health Policy and Management at the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University
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There is no question that the climate crisis with increasingly dry, increasingly flammable woodland fuel and rising surface temperatures is contributing to more wildfires in California and elsewhere. Moreover, while we focus on renewable energy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, trying to prevent climate change can sometimes undermine the ability to adapt to the changes already taking place.
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The private sector is as much a part of building disaster resilience as the government agencies. This is not limited to the utility providers. Bonds and other financial instruments for development often do not adequately account for disaster risks when firms underwrite building communities in vulnerable areas. Developers are also often more incentivized to build than to build resilience.
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Gov. Gary Newsom (D) and the state of California have the opportunity to take these ongoing threats, and re-frame how we approach disasters. Building resilience with strong partnerships with the private sector, integrating vulnerability and climate change into the costs of economic development, investing in modernizing infrastructure are all spoken of conceptually, but lack a blueprint for making it happen.
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California can provide a roadmap for how to bring together the myriad of stakeholders and their competing agendas to work collaboratively toward a common goal of resilience. Achieving these things politically, legislatively, and practically with the whole community will provide the approaches and illustrative examples so desperately needed to build national resilience. But only if the state’s leadership that is up for the challenge.
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