The University of Maryland Environmental Finance Center (EFC) developed this guide with support from the Maryland Department of Natural Resources (DNR) to help local governments assess and improve their capacity for increasing climate change resilience. The guide provides an approach for developing a baseline of local government operations as it relates to climate change, integrating climate change into local daily decision making, and enhancing the core functions of local government to better enable the implementation of climate action strategies.
This guide is intended to be particularly useful for small and medium-sized municipalities regardless of whether they are located on the coast or inland. It provides easy-to-use worksheets with corresponding action resources, templates, and case studies.
This guide focuses on strategies that facilitate implementation. It does NOT detail strategies for conducting a vulnerability assessment, climate action and resilience planning, or addressing specific hazards or risks (e.g., flooding, drought) since plenty of tools and guidance already cover these topics and are referenced throughout the document. Most of the implementation strategies and actions identified in this document do not require formal planning and assessment to get started. These strategies for integrating climate change into local government operations largely take a "no-regrets" approach, meaning they are actions that will likely benefit the community regardless of whether they are explicitly tied to climate change impacts or objectives.
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Resilience Finance and Capacity for Local Governments_V1.pdf (629.88 KB)