WHATELY — Residents with thoughts on where they would like to see pollinator-centered landscape projects are encouraged to join town officials for a community forum on Thursday, Feb. 27.

With the help of an $82,542 Municipal Vulnerability Preparedness Program (MVP) grant, the town is undertaking “The Future Looks Like Whately: Planting Resilience Through Nature-Based Solutions,” which will see three town-owned properties become demonstration sites for projects that support native plants and pollinators while building climate resilience. Whately is partnering with Leyden-based Landscape Interactions, a landscape design and planning agency.

The project kicked off in November and the forum marks the start of the next phase. It will be held Thursday, Feb. 27, from 6 to 7:30 p.m. A town-wide survey will also be available for about two weeks after the forum to collect as much feedback as possible, according to Community Development Administrator Erica Roper.

“Our goal is to get people involved because this is a really exciting project,” Roper said, adding that a major initiative behind this project is flood mitigation. “Figuring out how to retain water from floods and keeping it so we’re not ponding our crop fields is important.”

Roper said each parcel under consideration is town-owned and the current list of possible sites includes, but is not limited to, the S. White Dickinson Memorial Library, the Town Offices, the West Whately Triangle and Whately Elementary School, as well as a trio of cemeteries in west, east and central Whately.

The ultimate goal of the project is to bring the community together to address the top hazards facing Whately as identified in its MVP plan, which are flooding, drought, severe wind and invasive species, according to Evan Abramson, founder and principal of Landscape Interactions.

“The idea is that this grant is using nature-based solutions to mitigate these threats and prepare conceptual designs and cost estimates,” Abramson said, adding that the projects are a way to “respond to climate change and to make a more cost-effective way to deal with disasters.”

He said the Town Offices could be a prime example of the projects being explored. With flat land around Sandy Lane, wind often erodes land and kicks soil around the area, and a windbreak could be created to slow down gusts, provide shade and attract a wide diversity of pollinators.

“The pollinators are important because Whately is a farming community,” Abramson said, “and a lot of the products grown in Whately depend on bee or insect pollination.”

Other potential projects include creating bioswales, rain gardens or a naturalized stormwater weather basin to catch water and prevent flooding.

At the Feb. 27 forum, Abramson said folks will hear an update on the work that was done in November and consider which three parcels should be home to the pollinator-centered landscape projects. From there, the feedback from the forum will be combined with the survey results.

More information about “The Future Looks Like Whately” can be found at bit.ly/3QdOzUS.

Chris Larabee can be reached at clarabee@recorder.com.