Storm Surge Speaker Series features Funding & Financing Climate Resilient Communities

Storm Surge will host its final Speaker Series program, “Funding and Financing Climate Resilient Communities'', on Tuesday, September 28 at 7:00 pm. People may attend in person at the Newburyport Senior Community Center or virtually via Zoom. Please register in advance for this free event at https://storm-surge.org. All COVID-19 protocols will be followed.

Climate change and sea-level rise are exacerbating the impacts of severe weather events and coastal flooding in New England. Newburyport’s Climate Resiliency Plan discusses how climate change will impact our infrastructure and outlines strategies for mitigating these impacts. The challenge now is to design and fund specific projects to implement the Plan. The September program in the Towards a Resilient Newburyport series will address this very question: How do we move from our Resiliency Plan to funded projects?

Joanne Throwe and Dan Nees of Throwe Environmental, LLC, will speak on the topic of "Funding and Financing Climate Resilient Communities." Throwe Environmental is a core partner organization in the Southeast New England Program Network and Field Liaisons for National Fish and Wildlife Foundation’s National Coastal Resilience Fund. They will share examples on how other cities on the East Coast have approached the challenge of moving from a resiliency plan to funded projects. Joanne and Dan will share information on tools and processes that can identify criteria for funding, and potential financing options. The Throwe team will discuss communities that are considering how to implement and fund climate resilience-focused projects.

The presenters will also highlight one of the tools and resources that they are using to guide their work: the Planning to Action: Climate Toolkit (PACT). Join us and learn about a practical framework for approaching climate funding and financing and how to take the first steps towards becoming more climate resilient.

Joanne Throwe is President of Throwe Environmental. Joanne has served as an environmental policy and finance expert in a variety of capacities for over 20 years, including as Deputy Secretary for the Maryland Department of Natural Resources, Chair of the EPA Environmental Financial Advisory Board, and Director at the University of Maryland Environmental Finance Center.

Dan Nees is a Project Partner at Throwe Environmental, and a Senior Fellow with the Center for Global Sustainability (CGS) at the University of Maryland. Prior to his tenure at CGS, Dan was the director of the University’s Environmental Finance Center. Dan has over 20 years of experience assisting communities in their efforts to finance environmental and sustainable development initiatives.

Joanne and Dan will be joined by Sanjay Seth and Michael Sanduski after the presentation for a panel discussion and questions and answers. Sanjay is the Climate Resilience Program Manager for the City of Boston. Michael is a Master in Public Policy candidate at the Harvard Kennedy School and concurrent MBA candidate at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth. This past spring Michael worked with a team of students from the Harvard Kennedy School on a framework for prioritizing resiliency projects in Newburyport and Salem.

This program will conclude the Speaker Series Towards a Resilient Newburyport.  Five programs have been presented since May covering topics related to the City’s Resiliency plan. Videos of prior months’ programs are available on the event archive page of the Storm Surge website  https://www.storm-surge.org/event-archive

Storm Surge will share questions from community members with the panel in advance of the program. Send your questions to storm-surge9@gmail.com.