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Building Community Resilience

To build a resilient community, we must strengthen our community such that it can resist, absorb, accommodate, adapt to, transform and recover from the effects of hazards in a timely and efficient manner.

Our communities must prepare for both acute events – like heat waves, heavy downpours, storms, or wildfires - and chronic events - like rising sea levels, worsening air quality, and population migration.

Building Resilience in the PNW

Building community resilience is not just about resilient infrastructure, it is about individual and community health and wellbeing, social connections, and local systems to build an overall capacity for bouncing back from adversity.

Washington State Community Resilience Initiatives

Below is a sampling of Resilience Programs and Initiatives in Washington:

  • Washington State's Department of Social and Health Services has partnered with George Washington University's Milikan Institute's Center for Community Resilience to grow community resilience and wellbeing through the establishment and strengthening of interconnected systems, authentic community engagement at the decision-making table and equity to to create permanent pathways out of poverty.
  • Washington State's Department of Natural Resources has multiple resilience initiatives:

Reslilience Initiatives in Snohomish County

Snohomish County is focused on building resilience through a variety of initiatives.

  • The annual Building Community Resilience Series, focused on topics related deepening skills and resiliency, connecting with others, and helping our community flourish.
  • The Snohomish River is the second-largest in Puget Sound and a critical watershed for salmon. The Snohomish Watershed Resilience Action Plan, developed in collaboration with the Washington Department of Natural Resources, is a 10-year plan to promote salmon recovery and watershed health throughout the Snohomish Basin.
  • The Snohomish Conservation District has developed the Agriculture Resilience Plan to will help farmers in our county plan for future changes and risk.
  • The county is currently developing a Communitywide Climate Resiliency Plan to help strengthen Snohomish County communities, businesses, ecosystems, and infrastructure to withstand a changing climate

Snohomish Country Climate Reslilience Plan Development Timeline.

Figure: Snohomish County Climate Resiliency Plan Development Timeline, from the Snohomish County Communitywide Climate Resiliency Plan

What Can you Do?

Get Involved in Resilience Planning

Snohomish County's climate resiliency plan is a community-driven effort that needs your input. Sign up on the Communitywide Climate Resiliency Plan page to receive email or text updates.

A Framework to help you get started building resilience in community or organization

Steps to Resilience Framework

When thinking about climate resilience, decision makers need a place to start. Below is a simple framework that encompasses the team building, data gathering, and decision-making processes needed for a team of engaged community members to enhance their resilience to climate-related impacts.

  • form a group to explore local climate issues
  • list their community assets—the things they want to protect
  • determine which assets could be harmed by climate-related hazards
  • investigate possible solutions
  • make plans to address their greatest concerns, and
  • take action to implement their plans

This Steps to Resilience Framework is provided by Climate.gov for any community organization to use.
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