Shi Institute hosts first resilience workshop in Beaufort

This month, in partnership with Beaufort County, the Resilient Cities Catalyst, and the Geos Institute, the Shi Institute hosted the first-ever Climate Ready America Regional Resilience Accelerator Workshop.

Since April of this year, Shi Institute Climate Resilience Manager Adelaide Bates has worked closely with the County’s Environmental Long-Range Planner to support the formation of a highly motivated Resilience Working Group committed to action. Group formation stemmed from the County’s Long-Term Resilience Strategy which was adopted in early 2024 and highlighted the need for the region to shift from planning to implementation.

This need was also conveyed during initial outreach by the CDRZ’s city and county governments and the region’s council of governments. To support the launch and assist the group in preparing to shift from planning to implementation, Adelaide referred Beaufort County to the Resilient Cities Catalyst.

The Resilient Cities Catalyst (RCC) is one of the two technical assistance partners for the Climate Ready America Southeast Navigator Network. Through Beaufort County’s participation in the program, RCC’s services were provided at no cost to the jurisdiction.

RCC was launched in 2020 with a mission to, “catalyze lasting change in cities and communities to solve the most pressing challenges of today and to build resilience for the future. In partnership with communities around the world, we are building capacity, designing and delivering resilience projects, and sparking long-term systems change.” RCC works with cities across the globe at neighborhood, city, regional, and global scales. To learn more about RCC visit https://www.rcc.city.

After partnering with Beaufort County, RCC designed the Regional Resilience Accelerator. This Accelerator consisted of the development of an inventory of the region’s resilience plans, policies, programs, and initiatives, online sharing sessions, and a full-day in-person workshop. The Accelerator was designed to convene decision-makers and resilience champions from throughout the region to develop a six-month roadmap for the working group focused on overcoming barriers and accelerating implementation.

The full-day, in-person workshop convened representatives from municipal and county governments, state agencies, and local organizations to develop a six-month roadmap for this soon-to-launch Regional Resilience Working Group. The roadmap includes important work on sea level rise, sustainable and accessible transportation, living shorelines, land and development policies and much more—all of which will make Beaufort more resilient to our changing environment.

Leading up to this workshop we hosted two online sharing sessions that allowed organizations the opportunity to share their current work before the workshop. These sharing sessions enabled us to focus the in-person workshop entirely on aligning work, identifying critical work that is missing, and developing pragmatic solutions to overcome barriers to implementation.

The Sept. 12 workshop hosted nearly 50 attendees from 20 different organizations. From a city mayor to a CDRZ community representative, to our state’s Hazard Mitigation Officer and area utility companies, attendees and organizations came from all different levels and sectors. The workshop’s activities resulted in an abundance of input from participants including identified activities, funding, resources, and stakeholders that will be necessary to achieve the goals of the working group. Now, RCC is synthesizing these materials from the workshop and developing a six-month roadmap for the working group.

At the Shi Institute, we strive to make a positive sustainability difference in communities across the state, and to engage students and faculty along the way (more soon!). We can’t wait to see what is next in this important work and are thankful to be collaborating with Beaufort County.