June 28, 2016

The National Academies’ ResilientAmerica Roundtable held their State of Resilience Leadership Forum and Community Workshop on June 28-29, 2016. The event featured representatives from local, state, and federal government; insurance companies; environmental organizations; universities; private foundations; and other interested parties.

The two-day event aimed to assess the current state of resilience on a variety of scales and to identify areas for improvement. A major focus was on community resilience to natural disasters, with notable case studies including the 2011 tornado in Joplin, MO; the 2008 floods in Cedar Rapids, IA; hurricane resilience in southeast Florida; and the response to Hurricane Sandy in New York and New Jersey.

Sessions addressed a wide range of issues, including public health, community engagement and education, social cohesion, public health, town planning and infrastructure, insuring against disasters, and the relationship between public and private contributions to community resilience.

Video recordings of all the sessions will be made available on the ResilientAmerica Roundtable’s website.

Source: The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine