Trust Council Resolution Submission - Climate Risk and Vulnerability Assessment

Extracted text (beginning)

2022 RESOLUTION SUBMISSION TO AVICC 
 
 
CLIMATE RISK AND VULNERABILITY ASSESSMENTS                ISLANDS TRUST 
 
RESOLUTION: 
 
WHEREAS the increasing impacts of climate change are requiring local governments and Islands 
Trust to develop robust climate adaptation plans and policies;  
 
AND WHEREAS these adaptation plans and policies must be grounded in a detailed analysis of 
the unique climate risks and vulnerabilities of each local area; 
 
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that AVICC & UBCM call upon the Province of British Columbia to 
fund and support the development and integration of climate risk and vulnerability assessments 
into Official Community Plan review processes. 
 
 
 
BACKGROUNDER: 
 
As the impacts of climate change are rapidly increasing across local communities in British Columbia, local 
governments and Islands Trust are needing to integrate robust adaptation planning measures into their 
local Official Community Plans and other local planning processes. This requires, first and foremost, the 
development of climate risk and vulnerability assessments for each community, but local governments 
often lack the resources, capacity, data, and/or knowledge to undertake these assessments, particularly 
in small rural communities.  
 
Climate risk assessments focus primarily on projected changes in climatic conditions in a particular area, 
highlighting potentially impacted assets and discerning the likelihood/severity of key impacts and their 
consequences. Climate vulnerability assessments tend to focus more on the exposure, sensitivity, and 
adaptive capacities of systems, assets, and populations with a certain area. Integrated climate risk and 
vulnerability assessments are needed to address both the vulnerability to, and impacts of, climate 
hazards in order to develop effective climate adaptation plans and foster resilient communities. 
 
Provincial funding and support could help local governments and Islands Trust respond to the pressing 
need to adapt to climate change with enhanced adaptation planning capacity, improved data collection 
and analysis, and knowledge sharing on best practices and standards.

First 3,000 characters. Open the original for the whole document.