Transcripts For CSPAN Climate Change And Community Planning 20160604

In terms of having a good independent bookstore, there are a lot of great big readers here. There is a population of excellent writers. The city has a little bit more literary vibrancy that people are aware of. Mayoro former los angeles being mayor his brother had been arrested, and he wanted to know who was the best criminal lawyer in las vegas. Fellow said, who is the best call oscar. Aid, on American History we visit the center for Gaming Research and we learn about how the industry has evolved. Bylas vegas was established what is now the Union Pacific lakeoad what was the salt railroad. They bought a ranch and decided they would lay a town out here. And we visit the National Atomic testing museum. The site was established in 1951 for the testing of nuclear devices. From the 1950s to the 1990s, mushroom clouds could be seen from miles. Watch the cspan cities toward today at noon eastern on booktv or sunday at 2 00 on cspan 3. Tour, workingies with our cable affiliates, and visiting cities across the country. Now, representatives from fema and the health and Human Services department discuss how communities can manage the effects of Climate Change. This is part of a form that was hosted by the new republic and center for American Progress. It is one hour. Everybody, this is part two. The first panel was focused on defining what concept this really is, and there was some inspiring rhetoric about what we can do to address those many issues that were raised. But id like this conversation to id like to pull it down to the street level, the Community Level. We have two people from the government here. So im not too worried about it getting wonky, i think at this point in the conversation, thats one bit. So let me just briefly introduce everybody here. My name is ryan. Im an editor with the new republic. I have edited it down to a few sentences. We have very impressive resume that would have taken the whole time to read them all. So ill just zip through. Sitting to my right is tim manning the deputy administrator for protection and National Preparedness at fema where hes responsibility for the federal governments efforts toward building whole Community Based resilience. Previously he was the secretary of the new Mexico Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management at Homeland Security adviser to former governor bill richardson. A former firefighter, mountain rescue specialist and geology. Then we have a senior associate in the planning and design group, where she specializes in revitalization, community sustainability, Environmental Justice. She also serves on the National Environment Justice Advisory Council to the epa and vice chair of the Maryland Commission on Environmental Justice and sustainability communities. Previously she was the director of the Environmental Justice initiative of the Natural Resources events council. Then we have khalil shaheed. Hes from the National Resources Defense Council. His work includes the Energy Efficiency for all projects which increase utility funded Energy Efficiency programs and the affordable multifamily housing sector, and the green neighborhoods project which promotes the expansion of green equity and communities. Previously he worked in urban and Rural Community development and post disaster recovering planning in his hometown. And finally Sandra Howard is the Senior Environmental Health adviser in the office of the assistant secretary for health at the u. S. Department of environmental of human and Health Health and Human Services, excuse me. A lot of capitalized words in the bios. She cochairs the hhs Environmental Justice working group and represents hhs on the Environmental Justice federal interagency working group. She also cochairs the senior Staff Steering Committee of the president s task force and Environmental Health risk and safety risk to children. That would be the worst. Previously she was the senior policy analyst in hhss office. So i think the best way to begin would be, actually get a better sense of what you all do in your work as it relates to the topic of the panel. So, just a couple of minutes each so that the audience can get a sense. All right. Well, good morning, everybody. And also i would like to make a point of noting that it is june 1st, beginning of the Hurricane Season, so now is the opportuniy to get ready. Prepared. You can download our app. I get paid every time you download it. No, i appreciate that and appreciate the center for American Progress and new republic providing this forum. In that lengthy bio, clearly we need editors at our federal agencies, as well. The description of being responsible for building a whole Community Preparedness, what we mean is at the core of what were talking about today. This notion that historically governments, local governments, State Governments, the federal government has been very good at preparing for the intersection of extreme events. Natural disaster ss and the populations in the context of what were capable of doing. And what that usually meant was very myopic, very much a few Government Employees sitting in an office somewhere writing a plan, writing a document on how the government will react in a vacuum. Separated from the communities. Separated from the people that we are here to serve. A number of years ago learning the hard lessons of a number of tragedies over the years that we kept repating, a new focus in how we do what we do, and thats where this notion of whole Community Preparedness came from. Is the idea that we cant just sit in a room with the door closed and assume that we know how to work with our communities, that it really needs to be kind of grassroots up. It needs to start with pulling together not just the groups that we have easy access to but the people who really live in the communities who are most truly affected by the communities, which tend to primarily be the disadvantaged, and vulnerable communities and start there, with the requirements, the needs of the places we live all across america. And that being the root of disaster preparedness, but more importantly our resilience efforts, how we build stronger and more resilient communities so we can withstand the shocks not simply respond and react when an event happens. So that is at the core. Its now at the core of everything we did from grant making to the state and local governments to our doctrinal development, things that we work on, execution of president ial policy directives, how we design our Public Policy. Its all at how do we empower particularly vulnerable pop significances, but the actual communities themselves, and then support their activities. Thats really at the core of what i do every day, what brings me back to work every day, is trying to help the people that, you know, sent me here. So, good morning, everyone. Glad to be a part of this conversation. So what do i do every day . I have so many things that i do that i have to sort of narrow down in my head, what do we talk about. So i work for a small Environmental Consulting firm called scio solutions, headquarters in charlottesville virginia. We do a lot of policy work and advocacy and planning, and design work with u. S. Environmental protection agency. Particularly with vulnerable communities, Environmental Justice communities, low income, disadvantaged communities, thats really the core set of constituencies that i work with. And we Work Together work with those constituencies to plan for a variety of eventualities. But most of them are communities that have been besieged by environmental threats of enormous magnitude. And how do you work with those communities to plan for the beneficial reuse of land and space after its cleaned up . How do you make sure that those communities dont continue to be vulnerable. How do you make sure that as we go about cleaning up our washington journal continues. Environmental legacy we dont bowl over the people who have lingered and suffered the longest. From those environmental threats. And how do you build new communities, or revitalize communities that really address longstanding historic inek times, many of which are based on race and class and national origin. We try to help local governments, help the federal government, help all of our clients think about, you cant just talk about ok now we have a new reality. We have climate vulnerability, and were going to create these new plans to make communities safer, without unlocking and dismantling the things that made people vulnerable in the first place. So we look at what are those historic policies, practices, history of residential segregation thats still very much with us. Especially here in the district of columbia and the nations capital, and in maryland, the state that i live in, that perfected rate space land use and zoning. Were still doing it. You know, though its fairly illegal since the passage of the 1968 Fair Housing Act but its still very much with us. And that vulnerability is baked into our policy. Its baked into federal policy, local land use policy and people like to not acknowledge that its still with us and its still what drives that inequity so we do serious analysis around what those vulnerabilities are. And many of them are environmental and Public Health in nature. And how we can address that, how we can redress those issues through policy stwrumts. But also through building the capacity of local communities to be able to drive their own revitalization. So you heart cecil and mark speak on the first panel. Cecil and i are part of the same organization as as the act for Environmental Justice and we have a history of doing that work from the community up so everywhere i am, whether its whether its in my work with epa, whether its my work for the Maryland State Commission on Environmental Justice and sustainable communities, i try to always be cognizant of what its like to live in a vulnerable place. So im from the Harlem Community in new york which has experienced a lot of different changes not the least of which is the wholesale sort of redevelopment of the community now. So now, im are thinking about vulnerability. But for the century that it was a predominantly africanamerican and Latino Community people were not that focused on our vulnerability. So how do you carry those messages forward in the policies that we are articulate today to redress those historic inequities but also to make people safe and make them secure and to give them the kind of environment that they can thrive in. So thats the kind of work that i touch on every day. Yes, again, thank you for having us here and this opportunity to speak. Again, with the National Resources Defense Council in the urban Solutions Program. The urban Solutions Program is fairly new. Were in to our third year now with nidc where as nrdc is a Large International organization with five offices in the u. S. And one in china, much of our work is on national and state policy initiatives. We sometimes like to think of urban solutions as taking those policy victories at the national, state level and looking at them in terms of the local and saying what do they look like in implementation, in local communities . So much of our work with partners in the Energy Efficiency for all coalition, looking at Energy Efficiency and multifamily housing affordable multifamily housing, working with communities, through green neighborhood retro fits, is sort of the culmination of that work. And actually bringing these policy victories in the environmental sphere and actually looking at how they are actually implemented in Impact Communities on the ground, and in their everyday lives. And in the context of disaster resiliency or disaster planning, or Emergency Management, which is a term that i prefer to use, because oftentimes, when we focus on disaster planning we sort of limit ourselves to preparation. And planning. But actually, Emergency Management covers four phases. You know the initial first most important is actually being mitigation. How can we stop them from happening . And when were talking about Climate Change, were still within a small window of opportunity to stop, you know, the worst of it from actually happening. So mitigation is very important. Particularly for, you know, communities that are socially vulnerable and marginalized and most at risk, because theyre likely going to have to suffer the consequences of any, you know, pending impacts, regardless of how well we plan for them. So mitigation and avoiding, you know, those risks are most important. And then you get to planning and preparation. But too often, you know, when we think of planning, we like to think of it in like oftentimes we romanticize planning and think of it in holistic and broader terms. But in actual policy it tends to mean protecting infrastructure and property, and moving people out of harms way. And thats really the limit of much of our planning. Such as it is. And then the third step is actually adaptation to new norms. And so we know that, you know, due to our actions, particularly again in the realm of Climate Change, you know, some of what weve already put into the atmosphere, its too late to undo those changes and so were going to have to adapt to new norms in climate and weather, both nationally, locally, but also around the globe. And then finally is the aspect of recovery. And again, you know, we often think of recovery in very romantic terms. We think of recovery as restoration of communities, as making communities whole. But when we talk about disaster planning, Disaster Recovery, and the function of these operations, you know, much of that is actually handled by local jurisdictions. And there are 22,000 of them across the country. So you can have 22,000 in various ways of dealing with Disaster Recovery. So while much of and while most of us like to think of Disaster Recovery in the realm of restoration, making communities whole, all too often local jurs dibzs and communities, and im sorry administrations, think of it as opportunity. Theres going to be a lot of new money coming into the city, into the nupt, how can we utilize that to invest, build new infrastructure, create new value where there was no value before. And when were talking about creating value out of property, out of the environment theres some communities that actually create more value than others. You know in this market economy and so some communities get deval used, some get marginalized, some get left out of that process so we have to be very mindful of these things going forward, and you know, how your city, how your local administration, how your local municipality you know, frames, defines, and understands this process of local development and recovery is very important for the outcome of that process. And you cant get to equity, you know, if there is an equity going in. If there isnt a push for equity going in. Good morning, everyone. And thank you for having me here. And thank you to everyone whos come out. I am Sandra Howard. I am a Senior Adviser in the office of the assistant secretary for health. And im going to try not to go over board on the little boxes in our family tree for our federal agency. But i am a i provide expert policy advice to the assistant secretary, and any of the Senior Leadership of the department of health and Human Service around Environmental Health issues. I picked the two that were closest in the hearts of this particular audience and that was Environmental Justice and Climate Change. And also issues related to childrens Environmental Health. I am on a small team of people in my office, and in order to make sure that we accomplish our mission, which is to promote the health and protect vulnerable populations to environmental risks, i need to depend on a much larger group of people throughout our department, with names that you would probably recognize, like the centers for Disease Control and prevention, nih, i try to promote that perspective in the work that they do, as well. I have counterparts in all of those agencies. I have counterparts in other federal departments. One of my counterparts is standing in the back and had one of these seats here today, mustafa ali. You and i worked together with other members of the federal family to promote Environmental Justice at the federal level. So i try to bring a Health Perspective to that and i try to bring an Environmental Justice perspective into interagency activities dealing with Climate Change, because Climate Change didnt always think of health first. Its gotten its profile raised quite a bit in the last several years as people begin to acknowledge that yes, there are Health Effects from Climate Change, and theyve been happening for awhile. And theyre happening to very specific groups of people. Climate change happens locally. What we experience here in the midatlantic is not at all what people are experiencing in the southwest. For example one instance where Climate Change is affecting people here in the midatlantic differently than ok well say in the Hampton Roads area in virginia, where they are very much concerned with Sea Level Rise. There are a number of course its a vibrant community there. Theres a lot of military installations there. And its very important for that area to be to be preserved from the effects of that. So theres a lot of work going on in that area. But that isnt the same at all as people who are experiencing drought that may be related to Climate Change. And that may be going on at the same time. You know, and were thousands of miles apart. So what we see here is going to be different there. And of course, it depends on what your population of concern is. For instance, there are occupational disparities. Occupational concerns. If you work outside for a living, youre really going to be concerned about increased heat, which is what were going to be expecting in Climate Change. So people who work in agriculture, for example, they may be at higher risk. People who are responders to disasters, theyre working outside all the time, you have to make sure that theyre safe, as well. So, i have there are a lot of people in the agencies, actually its a huge agency. So in order to get a lot of people you just skim a few off of the agencies who are interested in this, and its amazing, actually, the kind of energy that you can im actually quite blessed to have people in agencies that have resources who are willing to work on this, but that is the case for health and Human Services. Is, Climate Justice is fundamentally a local issue. And it is mobilized at the grassroots level. But of course, you have governmental, political, legal, other forces that influence how you address these issues on a local level. So what im curious, and this is a question for everybody, of how how do you how do you mobilize a an entire community when there are so many overlapping agencies, federal, local, you have nonprofit you know, local nonprofit, i mean, it makes my brain hurt to think about how many different groups are theoretically overlapping on one particular issue, whether its, you know, rising sea levels or drought out west or, you know, could be an issue like whats happening in flint. How do you how do you coordinate and mobilize in a way that actually is effective between all those various factions . Could i just clarify one thing . Yeah. Yeah. Actually Climate Change isnt international. Its a global issue. The effects are felt locally and they may vary. I guess i meant that the issue of Climate Justice specifically is local in the sense thats where its impacts are felt, in our own neighborhoods. So the impacts are local. But the issue itself is not local. Right . So there are federal aspects to it. There are state aspects to it. If you live in tribal communities, there are tribal government aspects to it. There are multiple levels of response. And then of course, there are the vulnerable populations, and so your question about how do you get all of those on the same page is a really good question. And one that we dont have a really good answer to yet. And different jurisdictions respond differently. Right . So i live in maryland. Twothirds of the population in maryland are all climate vulnerable because we live in the Chesapeake Bay. We dont live near the Chesapeake Bay, we live in the Chesapeake Bay and every bit of vulnerability that affects the bay from weather to rising sea tide to drought or inundation from rain as weve had for the past three weeks, yall are lucky if you dont live here, this is one of the first weeks we have not had rain every day. And that creates more vulnerability, right . If you have bad infrastructure. How do you get all of the folks on the same page . One of the things is to make sure youre clear about who is central to the conversation and who is central to the conversation are the people who live in the various communities, the people who live in vulnerable areas. And most local jurisdictions dont really recognize or prioritize those vulnerable populations as being essential to the conversation. Khalil and i were talking earlier and hes going to say more about the vulnerability of folks in new orleans but there was a lot of planning and theory that went on, right . But thousands of people were not incorporated into the plan. There was just an article in the Washington Post last week, that said 46 of the American Public cannot respond to a 400 emergency. Right . So if you cant respond to a 400 emergency, you surely cannot mobilize your household and your resources to be able to response to some serious weather related or climate related threats. You cant get out of vulnerable. So local government, State Government, tribal government, and federal government need to be working with community. And that, you know, we say it and it rolls off our tongue really easily but its really challenging for a environmental entities, no matter what jurisdictional level theyre at, to really work with local communities. When you add race and class, and national origin, and immigration status to that conversation, that it bakes in to the to the process that some people are going to get left out of the conversation and theyre going to get left out consistently out of the conversation, and so, local communities have to mobilize themselves. And in the e. J. Instance, many communities have mobilized themselves and driven this Public Policy conversation that were having about Climate Justice and climate vulnerability. It wouldnt be happening if it werent for the mobilization for the research for the advocacy for the work that local communities have done to bring this conversation into the national fore. And the only upside of katrina is that people recognized that there was this whole vulnerable layer of people who otherwise are not being addressed or factor into Public Policy about how we make communities safer. And so the communities themselves are mobilizing. Theres very little resource that mobilization to happen. But yet people are doing it anyway. The whole Environmental Justice conversation and Climate Equity conversation is one that has been largely mobilized by a completely unresourced avienna. Of people using their own resources, mobilizing their own communities, structures, mobilizing their social networks to be able to inform folks and help them navigate this policy arena. But theres a lot of money on the table for climate and climate vulnerability. Very little of it is going to the most vulnerable populations and communities that serve those populations. If i could add, i think you know, one important distinction, and its really time to understand why the Climate Justice movement, and really be the first panel would have been much better i think in some ways im answering this question and there have been institutions that we necessarily represent here why it has to be local. The response to Climate Change has to be about more than just engineering, technology, its not just putting solar panels on your roof. But its really about how we live as a society. Its about the way that were social organizers. Its about the hireerarchyies that we create and many of us want to dismantle. Its about communities ability to live, theyre right to live. Its about policing. Its about wages. Its about jobs. Its about the way that we structure and organize our society. Not only in response to this catastrophe but really in response to those ongoing and mundane crisises of inequality, of burden, of marginalization. Its very easy to get lost in the event of a disaster or a cataclysm. But what those events actually do is really accentuate and heighten the ongoing, the mundane oppressions that people are facing every day. It just makes it much more difficult for people actually respond and to live. And so thats why, again, when i go back to, you know, oftentimes when we speak about disaster planning what its really about again is protecting property, its protecting the environment and really corralling people without any agency, without any voice, and then moving them out of harms way and saying, ok, we dont have any more liability for you, now its up to you to, you know, to survive through the length of this event. And so, thats, you know, really what it is in practice. You know, even if its not always that in intent. Thats important. So, its great to hear that there are communities that are mobilizing themselves. But in a more just world it wouldnt be left to most of our local populations to band together. The least resourced to actually pull that off. So how do you rectify that . Surely there are many communities that could use the help that arent mobilizing, they just dont have the resources, they dont have that leader who has decided to make it their mission to mobilize the community . Then who needs to step in . Who needs to make that happen . Id like to jump in on that for a second. When were just in the context of how we do management. There are mechanisms on how kind of the power structures coordinate very well. Established mechanisms across the whole spectrum of prevention and mitigation as well as response and recovery. Theres been advancements in the last six to seven years on how we do that. I think thats the important point. The same time that we recognize that there was the selforganization happening at the grass roots at communities didnt necessarily recognize what was required. What needed and we needed to change the way we did everything to be able to empower and support the communities at the Community Level and drive that kind of intersection. A lot of that stems from simply the lack of capability at that local government level. And State Government level. Not the level of expertise or capacity of the individuals are doing the job. The amount of work that has to be done and the people to do that work. Most communities, most large American Cities have maybe one or two people who do this full time. If theyre lucky theyll have two or three. A city the size of washington has a moderately sized agency very capable but fairly small. Its an amazing amount of work to pull together every grass roots organization, every neighborhood they try. Its just a lot of work. What weve been trying to do in a complete restructuring of how we do Emergency Management policy, Homeland Security policy across the country is to kind of come at it both directions. Shifting the national policy, shifting the priorities of the resources that we make available and the mechanisms and guidance for how we all do this kind of Community Level Community Based planning to empower and encourage and in some cases in grant making require that communities do that level of engagement at the grass roots level. Because to be informed by Lessons Learned and experiences as well. When we look at katrina, if we look at the fatalities theres two sides of this. One is life saving, thats the middle of the night, initial response, save as many lives as possible. We have historically you know, the Emergency Management community has been very good at that. But we need to build a better recognition. You look at katrina, many people point to the fact at a 90 evacuation rate. The most successful evacuation in American History. Weve never moved that percentage of a population in a disaster before. But that still left 100,000 people behind. Something like 80 of which were poor disadvantaged and minority communities. If you look at the fatalities, it the demographics are about 50 50 between africanamericans and whites. It was 80 were over 69 years old. So you have vulnerable populations across all the different demographics. We havent necessarily paid attention to in the past. The people that if you look at the evacuated populations, they were the preponderance were poor, disadvantaged from particular neighborhoods who basically were 80 unbanked. That had no access to credit. Had no bank accounts. That had no cash reserves. And didnt own a car. And didnt own a car, exactly. So there are by studying the hard learned lessons, we have been pushing communities encouraging like i said requiring communities to focus n specific areas. Now, what that ends up with is often government efforts towards specific kind of economic drivers. Its all interconnected. When we talk about Climate Justice or social justice or economic justice, any of these, theyre all interwoven and connected. You cant differentiate. A disaster is the intersection of an extreme event with a population, with people. Right. A tornado in a field is just a tornado. By studying why, for example, the work that came out of purdue many of you probably saw that the trailer parks tend to actually be tornado mag nets because they happen to be in vulnerable areas thats where land is cheap and thats where they develop and people economic disadvantaged folks live there. We can put resources where necessary and identify the communities we need to pull in and build these mechanisms to interconnect. Im glad you brought up katrina. Because obama was president obama. It rankles me when people call me obama. His name is president obama and it will be for the rest of his life. Lets just go with that. Ok. As an editor on second reference, its just obama, its a habit. He was met with fema yesterday on the eve of the 2016 Hurricane Season. And i dont remember the exact quote he said something to the effect of its the disasters that we havent experienced before that are the ones were trying to prepare for. But the first thing that crossed my mind when he said that was, well, when sandy happened, a lot of people were like, wow weve seen this before. It was only a few years earlier. So to those of us who arent dont work on the issues on a daytoday basis either on a federal or grass roots level or anywhere in between, what lessons have we actually learned from katrina and what are our vulnerabilities today . I mean, we could have another sandy style storm this year. People are going to see geez how many times maybe it happens in south florida. Different jurisdiction, but what is actually being done to prevent this level of disaster . So if i can throw a couple things out real quick and hand off the the in the context of the conversation yesterday its an important point that the president was making in that a lot of people base their Decision Making, todays Decision Making on what they perceive as their experience or the experiences of their families and friends. And often that misleads people into a level of comfort. So for example, across florida, this was part of the conversation. In 2004 five different hurricanes crossing across the state of florida. And everybody in florida says ive been through a hurricane. The reality is they probably didnt experience Hurricane Force winds. They probably they may have gotten storm surge in a different way it will manifest. Their perception is incorrect. So what happened in sandy, good example. So this is something that has shifted. The National Weather service, that storm, Hurricane Sandy as it passed a certain point in latitude it became extra tropical. You wanted to get wonky, well get wonky. Meaning it was no longer fit the meet definition of a Tropical Storm. It wasnt a hurricane anymore. It had the same storm surge and impact on the coastal communities on new jersey and new york as it went north. It was no longer a hurricane. So that warning, what weve conditioned people and to say hurricane, be prepared for that impact, people thought this isnt going to be a big deal. Its not a hurricane its going to be a big storm. Exact same impacts as we saw up and down the coastal communities. The weather service, noaa and the Hurricane Centers changed the way they did that. There will be new warnings this year, storm search watch and warning. A hurricane, again, wonky. Hurricane warnings are about wind speed, how fast the winds are. It has no bearing on the level of storm surge, which kills 50 of the people who die in hurricanes die from storm surge. Water being pushed ashore. It has no the level of wind speed, it impacts that. Its disconnected. You can have fatal storm surge at a low wind speed, in a Tropical Storm for example which weve seen. There will be new watches and warnings, another example of how we learned. We underestimate our level of risk, underestimate the likelihood of something negatively impacting us. We have to continue to beat that drum, that our communities need to take a dispassionate look at the real risk and understand that across the whole spectrum of stuff like being adequately insured as well as everything else. So but being inadequately insured is something that requires resource and living in a place where you can get insurance, right . There are whole parts of louisiana where you can no longer get Flood Insurance or you can only get certain kinds of Flood Insurance thats really really expensive. We had an earthquake here in the d. C. Metro area, the epicenter was centerville, virginia, in 2005 2009, 2010. When i called my Insurance Agent to talk about it he literally laughed at me. He said nobody in maryland has earthquake insurance. I said we have fracking nearby, maybe we should think about it. Right . Its not just those policy instruments, its thinking about the reality of how communities live their lives and how those policy instruments either meet their needs or dont address the needs and overlook whole populations. This notion of things being driven by Property Value and property evaluationvaluation. One of the Climate Justice conversation brings to this whole conversation is we know everyones lives are not equal. We know that acchewthere are tables how you restore communities and make people whole. Certain populations are down on the bottom of that valuation. We need to rethink that. Thats driven about the federal government . Right . And the private insurance sector. They take a lot of that information from the federal government and we need to challenge and rethink the structures we have in place that respond to either those crisises or the vulnerability. It cannot be property based. We know there is no community of color in the United States, even the one i live in, which is the most affluent one in the United States that is equal to the nearest white community, right . That is, again, baked in our process. If this is how we restore communities the formula around which we do that restoration and we make people whole has to be completely taken apart and put back together with vulnerability and inequity baked into that process. We dont have that now. When the storms come and they are going to come, right, when the crisises happen again and they are going to happen again, what have we done to make people less vulnerable . I dont know that i am comfortable with sort of where we are. I dont know that the people who were hurt in the past are not going to be hurt again. Clearly, you were in new orleans. And youve been working in this field ever since. What are you biggest fears right now . Well, my biggest fears are twofold. One we havent learned those lessons. You know, as she said if youre thinking about natural disaster, what are sort of the two common, biggest fears one is the power goes out or two you actually lose your home and are forced to evacuate or leave your home. Well, again, for many, many you know low income communities, communities in poverty across the country those are common occurrences to have your power shut off because your utility bills are in arrears. To live in marginal unsafe insecure housing status. And so, again, you know, disaster accentuates that. One, you have to have resources to get your family out of harms way. Because youre out of harms way those obligations dont disappear. Whether its mortgage, rent, those creditors are still coming doing whether youre being evacuated. I dont think we have one, learned and certainly arent really acknowledging in terms of our planning and implementation the full cost to these communities of having to leave home and, again, you know if youre in an unprotected labor status. If youre in new orleans and working in a restaurant and a hurricane comes through forces people to evacuate. The demand and needs for labor all change post disaster. You could easily lose employment if youre in a unprotected labor status. All of these things should be a part of our planning process. Its typically on reinforcing property getting people out of harms way and well see where we at when the water recedes. Not really accounting for the full lives of people in these communities. And so, you knowb that is one fear. Also, what we saw after katrina, what she alluded to was the fact whereas the community is thinking about restoration after the storm. The city in many cases not everyone, but, you know, really powerful interests and a lot of these local administrations are thinking about opportunity. You know, its opportunity to redevelop the city. Opportunity to increase the value of the urban footprint through these investments. There was it was spoken and unspoken after katrina that the mayors administration i remember him saying this clearly, his administration was not going to determine the place and pace of recovery. The market would. And so the market put dollars where it was neighborhoods were ready to receive those and those tended to be those communities that were least affected by the storm, not those that needed it most. If youre talking about cities rely on the urban footprint, they rely on property, they rely on the value of urbban land to drive economic growth. Black communities, latino communities, we cannot match the Property Value of white identity in these markets. And so even if you look at a city like washington, d. C. , washington, d. C. Created go go music. You cant hear go go music within washington, d. C. Because there was no way to commercialize go go music for the new middle class communities that were coming in. Creative class. And push that out. White cultural identity has a Property Value communities of color cant much. It will be emphasized when cities think as a chance to create new opportunity. Those are communities that get prioritized. I just want to go back to your first fear a little bit. I agree we havent done enough to address the social determinants of health so people are able to deal with the every day problems that we have, that may or may not be relate todayd to Climate Change. We have spoken a lot about disasters. There will be more as the Climate Changes. There are also more subtle effects well be seeing over time such as increased air pollution and we know that a lot in our communities suffer disproportionately from conditions like asthma. We must address those risk factors so people will be able to remain healthy and resilient in communities communities remain resilient. The population is changing. Who is here in america now . Its going to look completely different in another 20 years or so. Younger population. A different mix of racial and ethnic groups. Certainly some Health Disparities could be exacerbated by whats happening. I think we know some things intuitively. But operationalizing thing is difficult. Its a challenge. Lets open it up to questions. Raise your hand if youve got one. Hello, my name is kevin, im from baltimore. I had a question about planning. So on a municipal level, lets say baltimore puts together a plan. That even if there is a open stake process if the city council doesnt pass it it doesnt happen. How do you bridge the gap between creating a plan and then making that policy that actually benefits underserved communities. So theres a pretty robust conversation going on in Baltimore City around their sustainability plan. A lot of people sit around their table, sustainability commission. Im not sure how many folk from vulnerable communities in Baltimore City serve on that commission. But, you know, this is a process that i can really relate to in terms of Community Based planning. You know, some years ago, almost 30, i recognized that the vulnerability of the place i lived which is where seizececil lives now. They were determining what opportunities would exist and what land uses would exist. We have a preponderance of environmentally threatening facilities none of which we voted to bring to the community but were designed and planned to be there. Which created other cascading vulnerabilities over the decades, right . I try to get a grip on what is it that we could do to change our reality . And what came to me is, one, we need to understand the land use and zoning process. Two, some of us need to get on a local land use and Planning Board so we can be the ones who help shape and drive the conversation. We did all of that. We mobilized 100,000 people. Everybody came out and participated. We voted in great people, blah blah blah, but the city still had its own vision. Particularly when the mayor changes, the mayor had a vision that wasnt about the quality of life of the folk that lives in the part of town i lived in. The mobilization of community is important. And connecting that to making sure you alect representatives who dont say the right thing but understand the nature of the problem and will do the right thing time in and time out. Thats where we have disconnected. We keep sending back to Office People that dont get it. He was talking about the mayor who said the market is going to determine what the restoration of new orleans is going to be. Hes in jail now, right . And other people are making determinations about how new orleans comes back. Al the lower ninth ward is still not revitalized. You can go through the ninth ward in new orleans and it looks like katrina and rita struck last year as opposed to 11 years ago. Mobilizing people is one part of the effort. But making sure that people are involved in that political process and driving that political process. And i think thats where we get there disconnect. We have got to come up with our own ideas. Weve got to be in that planning conversation and that zoning conversation. Weve got to be on the zoning board. Nobody wants to do it. I get that. Its boring. In our case it was even dangerous in the Planning Board we had because we had so much racial tension on the board. Youve got to do it. Youve got to step up and do these things that give you the reins of power. Theres a sustainability conversation going on and a environment justice and racial conversation going on. I dont see those conversations connecting in a substantial way. May name is emily, ill at that epa and im from florida. My question is about the policy instruments that were going to need to move forward with resilience that are going o have to be pretty wonky complicated theres a lot of as we all know adaptation varies between local areas. My question is how do federal agencies develop those policies that can be nuanced enough to account for things like equity and protecting historical communities, while at the same time maybe disincentivizing new development in coastal areas that is in the long term going to be vulnerable. And my example of this is the Flood Insurance reforms that passed in in 2012 that hit florida. We saw a bash lashcklash. I would love perspective on the complicated policy process. How we get the real effective policies we need when it is such a complicated issue between the federal and local areas. This is where everybody looks at me, right . I think its a great question. It is, obviously, an extraordinarily complicated one. Theres a confluence of a great number of interests that have differing opinions on how we move forward there. So the bigger waters act moved the national Flood Insurance Program Towards soundness in a short time frame which we carried out. Were in the process of carrying out. There was a backlash because the Flood Insurance program, ill just very quickly, there are other experts within the agency on that. The Insurance Industry to your point earlier walked away from Flood Insurance decades ago because it was they couldnt yeah, they were too many losses. Congress stepped in and create a federal Flood Insurance program which we were charged with and have been carrying out. After the next step was the program is still moving towards actuarial soundness. Its carrying a deficit largely on the back of katrina but other disasters as well. But the key is, that we have to find a solution that doesnt subsidize development in risky areas, not to prohibit development in risky areas but not subsidized on the backs of the American People. There are other avenues that are fruitful. For example, the president issued a new federal Flood Insurance im sorry. Flood standard. Which required any Development Using federal funds or federal buildings to be built with mitigation built in mind. That is above two to three above the base Flood Elevation to account for Sea Level Rise and Climate Change. That depending on the criticality of the facility. Fire houses or things that have a more critical government requirement have a higher elevation. Other places as well where, for example, after the tornados and more when the president was visiting the school where students and a teacher died he asked why werent there shelters there for example. Building storm shelters has always been an eligible thing using federal fema money, recovery money but wasnt required and was at the discretion of the local community. But we were able to use the kind of instruments of power here to adopt Building Codes are a local determination as well. Planning and zoning and Building Code determination. We were able to Institute Like the flood standard using federal money you have to build back to these Building Codes which include shelters for schools. There are ways to incentivize weve been using to push this conversation and to actually push changes in areas that are vulnerable to changes in weather patterns or extremes of weather patterns as a result of changing climate. It will always require as youve heard from all of my distinguished colleagues here on the stage the last hour, the concerted effort of everybody from the grass roots level, influencing those in power, taking the reins of power to push those local decisions in the right directions. At the same time pushing us in washington to encourage and facilitate those actions happening. All right. We have time for one more. I saw another hand over here. Hi, im with the union of concerned scientists. Theres a number of forces that are largely outside of the control of the government and Nonprofit Institutions you all represent. Namely im talking about Global Market forces like real estate, the tech boom for example that is driving real estate prices really quickly in places like San Francisco and then driving up vulnerabilities driving down the capacity for resilience of especially low income populations. And those people are not in this conversation, of course. The representative of those forces. How do we rein in those forces . How do we bring the interests . Those are the drivers that are going to drive that down and increase the resilience of population populations. Who wants to rein in the Global Market forces here . I think one thing hes just said thats really important to recognize is that the more vulnerable populations you have, the more the cost goes up to restore and at least get back to some level of parity over and over again. Every season. We do this every season in this country. It costs money. And so many if people if we could introduce them to that conversation evaluation of every life, right . So what he mentioned we know there is some populations we value more than others. We still have a cost to bear to restore new orleans. We havent restored all of new orleans, weve spent billions of federal dollars trying to do it. Weve done it in kansas city, weve done it in lots of places that have experienced climate related emergencies and disasters. I think we have to introduce into that valuation process that we keep paying for this. Right . So either we plan to protect all communities or we cant paying for it. Then we stop bitching about paying for it. Either you plan for vulnerability and restoration and plan so people have health resources, housing resources, Food Security and income and job security, you either bake that into your plans or you keep paying for it. And so either we keep paying for it or we change that dynamic. You know, each of us as individual taxpayers are contributing to this conversation. I may be contributing more to it given what the Hurricane Season is and what it does to us in maryland this coming year. Im ok with that. But i can be ok with it because i have the resources. Every day doesnt get to make that determination. I can get away from the emergency everybody cannot. Until we change our notion of what our policy is to value every life we will keep paying for the consequences and keep building vulnerable communities in vulnerable places. We have to change that dynamic. If its brief. I would answer that, you know, i think its very important to communicate these changes as a development imperative. It is imperative for us to alter our society to adapt to our changing realities. And so and when i say that what i mean is we have disparate plans, cities have resiliency plans, disaster planning plans that are really sometimes located in very different agencies that dont communicate with each other, the financing and management are not really talking. So we need to be able to look at that holistically. And also, when you get at the issues of health, you know, social wellbeing, you know, those are typically not really a part of those plans except maybe in the demographic section. You know, because those issues, health, social welfare, social mobility those are set aside to welfare programs. Theyre not a part of urban planning documents. And so thats welfare policy. Its a very separate thing. We need to be able to bring all those things together holistically. Thats what i mean by communicating it as a development and social imperative and not a market opportunity. To go back really quickly on the policy, one, you know, we need to really recognize, again, the differences in value. And so its not compensating communities for the present value without understanding how certain communities are undervalued. Two as someone born and raised in a flood plain, its recognizing the existence and the impact of what i call geographically bounded livelihoods. If you look in the gas sector in louisiana it requires you to live in a flood plain. If youre an oyster shrimper on the coast it requires you to live there. Those patterns disrupt livelihood options, it creates travel time, other costs. Our Flood Insurance programs and the way we think about changing them need to account for all the different variables that different communities experience in relationship to livelihood, cost, and historical valuation of communities moving forward. Thank you very much to all of you for coming. N, video from the senate floor from their very first session. The senate is a 21st Century Institution trying to make the best use of technology to remain true to the 18th century conception. It is a difficult thing to do to forge compromise. Little. Y has to give a the cameras conceal it by not showing these conversation take place. Humbling moment for me. I am majority leader, five the majority for me is slim. This is one of the most divided moments in history. We are witnessing something that. As never before happened you can see more of our special on 30 years of senate floor coverage tonight on cspan. Booktv has 48 of nonfiction books and authors every weekend. Here are some programs to watch for. Lifemajority discusses his in politics and his book, a memoir. All majorities are fleeting. Depending on what the American People decide, i could be the minority leader next year