How can towns adapt in their decisions about roads and culverts, dams and watersheds, well protection and other issues in the face of climate change?
A Thursday Franklin Regional Council of Governments workshop on climate change adaptation is being offered for planning and selectboards, agricultural and conservation commissions, boards of health, highway department personnel and others to learn more about preparing for climate change and severe weather events.
COG staff will offer a primer on the state’s Climate Change Adaptation Report and present findings from a recent survey on Climate Change Adaptation and Resiliency.
The staff will also describe a new project creating a database of all “critical infrastructure” and talk about the role of forests, rivers, watersheds and other natural resources in climate resiliency, with a discussion of potential strategies for towns to adapt.
There will be a discussion of how private wells have been affected by drought and what actions boards of health can take to protect drinking water.
The session is an outgrowth of a project, funded by a state Community Compact grant, to help the region take stock of how climate change could affect the communities’ natural resources and habitat, local economy and government, as well as infrastructure like energy, wastewater and stormwater systems.
The workshop, is meant to address specific concerns that town officials have about their communities, said the COG’s Land Use/Natural Resource Program Manager Kimberly Noake MacPhee.
Other COG presenters will be Mary Chicoine, land use/natural resource planner; Dan Nietsche, emergency planning coordinator and Glen Ayres, regional health planner.
To register, email Registrations@frcog.org or call 413-774-3167, ext. 100.