Episode 11: Evaluating Sea Level Rise Adaptation Planning in California

Today we are talking with the University of California, Santa Barbara project team leading a statewide evaluation of sea-level rise adaptation planning across California’s 76 coastal jurisdictions. One of the products of this work will be a user-friendly online inventory of adaptation planning occurring throughout the state. The Ocean Protection Council and the Office of Planning and Research are closely tracking the progress of this project and exploring opportunities to align and potentially merge the products from this work with the state’s Adaptation Clearinghouse.

Applying lessons learned from current and past action, the project team will develop recommendations for improving California’s coastal adaptation planning process, including the Local Coastal Plan policy update process. They will also assess alignment between local plans and the State’s Sea Level Rise Principles, released October 2020. “I think of California’s coast as a laboratory of sorts, with all of these locations that are really diverse...if we can understand each of these places a little bit better, we might find little nuggets of wisdom about how to do a better job at making decisions”, says Dr. Charles Lester, the Principle Investigator on the project. This project will help California find ways to “plan for the long-term but take meaningful action today...and how do we take those actions today so as not to prejudice or ruin the future for our kids and our grandkids”, adds Lester. California needs to move away from the “emergency-response” method that has dominated action around coastal resilience to flooding, erosion, storm surges, and sea-level rise and move towards thoughtful long-term planning with adaptation pathways and triggers that keep the ultimate goals developed by each local community in mind.

Credits:
Video Production, Editing, and Narration: Kat Beheshti
Drone footage: Charles Lester
Photos: Charles Lester
Video Thumbnail Photo: Charles Lester
Video Footage: Kat Beheshti, Charles Lester

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