MSU Extension Team Receives Regional and National Cross-Programming Team Excellence Awards
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EmailMichigan State University Extension (MSUE), together with the Great Lakes Integrated Sciences & Assessments, examined climate impacts and resilience strategies to assess public attitudes towards climate change.
BY: SPDC Communications
Michigan State University Extension (MSUE), together with the Great Lakes Integrated Sciences & Assessments, examined climate impacts and resilience strategies to assess public attitudes towards climate change, and identify opportunities for climate adaption within the City of Marquette and Benton Harbor-St. Joseph urbanized area.
These organizations also teamed up with the Lake Superior Watershed Partnership and Land Trust, the City of Marquette’s Community Development Department and the Southwest Michigan Planning Commission to create project reports to inform a long-term climate change adaption planning for Marquette and the Benton Harbor area.
The MSUE project is titled “Adapting to Climate Change and Variability: Planning Tools for Michigan Communities,” and is the result of the work of a collaborative team of Michigan State faculty members and students. Wayne Beyea, MSUE Specialist in the Urban & Regional Planning Program at the School of Planning, Design and Construction, co-led the team with Claire Bode, Specialist of Public Policy Education from the MSUE Greening Michigan Institute.
The team applied for recognition from the National Association of Community Development Extension Professionals (NACDEP), and after winning the North Central Regional Award, continued on to the National award-level. At the 9th annual NACDEP Awards Banquet, hosted June 2014 in Grand Rapids, MI, the MSUE team took home the title of National Runner Up for the Cross-Programming Team Excellence Award.
According to Beyea, "The project has been an excellent example of how a multi-disciplinary team from Michigan State University Extension can collaborate with multiple organizations to develop a model process that results in stakeholder-driven climate adaptation plans for two Michigan communities."
As part of the project, the organizations arranged two public community conversation gatherings on climate change in Benton Harbor and Marquette.
The MSUE team, including members from the Greening Michigan Institute, also created maps for each city, which showed areas of vulnerability—Marquette, with a focus on climate vulnerability; and Benton Harbor, with a focus on transportation network resiliency.
According to Davis Stensaas, City Planner for Marquette, MI, "This process and the information that emerged from it has raised awareness regarding climate change, in and around Marquette, and has created acceptance of municipal leadership to address planning for adaptation to climate change."
“The [project] report has already encouraged . . . member agencies to take their own initiative and explore new grant opportunities that will allow them to examine community vulnerability in the broad context of their physical, social and economic assets,” said John Egelhaaf, Executive Director of the Southwest Michigan Planning Commission.
Please join us in congratulating this team for their achievements!
