Washington, D.C. — Cathleen Kelly, Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress, issued the following statement in response to the White House Council on Climate Preparedness and Resilience report titled “Opportunities to Enhance the Nation’s Resilience to Climate Change.”
This White House report lays out a solid strategy for federal agencies to help strengthen community resilience against more frequent and intense storms, heavy downpours, flooding, heat waves, and sea-level rise. These dangerous effects of climate change hit low-income communities and communities of color the hardest, where residents confront daily the symptoms of historic inequities, from poor quality housing to economic instability. The report calls on agencies to meaningfully engage community stakeholders to develop fair and equitable resilience strategies and to target investments in communities that have been historically overlooked. By urging agencies to integrate climate change preparedness into their missions and programs; provide communities with high-quality climate change risk information; and create incentives for resilient infrastructure and buildings, this White House report builds on President Barack Obama’s already strong climate change legacy by helping to reduce the public health and safety risks of climate change, including in the most vulnerable communities.
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