We at StormSmart are big fans of the Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium’s Coastal Community Resilience Index. For those not familiar with it, the Coastal Community Resilience Index (CRI) is a simple tool that provides a snapshot of a community’s resilience, and can help identify opportunities to improve.
Designed to take as little as two hours to complete, the CRI focuses on 6 areas (critical infrastructure and facilities, transportation issues, community plans and agreements, mitigation measures, business plans, and social systems), and is facilitated by a neutral, trained party. The CRI process is inclusive of city/county/parish staff, business representatives, and key local community members. There is no cost to communities for the meetings, and local facilitators can provide additional tools and support for activities to address areas of concern. In addition, the CRI provides tie-ins to gain points in the Community Rating System.
From Texas to Florida, communities across the Gulf Coast have already completed the CRI, and trained facilitators are available in every Gulf state.
To schedule a CRI workshop with a trained facilitator, contact Jody Thompson, CRI Regional Outreach Coordinator, Auburn University/Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium at jody.thompson@auburn.edu or 251/438-5690.
For more information, visit the Coastal Community Resilience Index’s webpage. We’ve linked to it from our Finding and Using Additional Hazard Information page.
(Implementation of the CRI is a project of the Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium, Auburn University Marine Extension and Research Center, the Gulf of Mexico Alliance, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Gulf of Mexico Program.)