Quote By: Abena Ojetayo, Chief Resilience Officer, Tallahassee, Florida
Abena Ojetayo is the first Chief Resilience Officer for Tallahassee, where she partners across city government and with external stakeholders to build the community’s capacity to adapt and thrive in the face of acute shocks and chronic stresses. She develops a cohesive sustainability and resilience strategy and oversees the integration of effective high-priority policies, programs, and initiatives. Abena has worked in various countries, including as an energy and infrastructure planner for a historic town in Greece devastated by an earthquake; managing an urban design team for a flood prone city in Nigeria, and helping to redesign a future-proof NYC campus in the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy.
Prediction
Cities will continue to experience unprecedented shocks and stresses to their systems, services, and way of life. Many of these events will feel unpredictable (like the scene of an active shooter), and at times, unavoidable (like being in the path of a hurricane). When disaster strikes, no uplifting hashtag can overshadow real and intentional planning. Federal emergency response aid will continue to decrease and be delayed as disasters become costlier and more frequent. That means cities must prepare to save themselves in the event of a disaster and rely on their own financial reserves to do so. This is the new normal.
From their ever-changing demographics to the exchanges beyond political boundaries, cities today continue to be places of great innovation and also great challenges. For cities that keep their heads in the sand, the impacts of these shocks and stresses will ripple throughout the entire community in profound ways. For those that plan ahead and invest upstream, their efforts will be greeted with enthusiastic new partners from unlikely sectors and innovative financial resources.
2019 Tip
As cities grapple with their increasingly complex systems and a changing climate fraught with risk, the seduction of globalization can tempt communities to take an approach from one corner of the world and apply it wholesale to their locality. But disasters are local, so too resilience must be hyper-local. Building resilience will take planning, mitigation, and adaptation from the global level down to the neighborhood and household levels within an appropriate cultural and historical context. Local government is where the rubber meets the road.
The built environment hardly exists in a void, and social cohesion is essential to community resilience. Here, too, local governments can help bring people together, create distributed yet integrated systems, and model civility. Against the backdrop of sensational 24-hour news, it will feel like the world is ending tomorrow. Strong communities support each other on “blue-sky” days, and on “gray sky days’” they remind each other that the sun will rise again and that together they can build a better future.
Learn More
Download Leading Edge Research: Disaster Recovery Essentials, a tool for preparing your community to face the unexpected.
Quote By: Geoff Beckwith, Executive Director & CEO, Massachusetts Municipal Association
Geoff Beckwith has held his position with the Massachusetts Municipal Association (MMA) for 27 years. MMA is an advocacy organization that secures billions of dollars in aid for cities and towns, passes reforms to streamline local government and give local officials effective management tools, and delivers education and service programs to localities. Geoff was a member of the joint opioid task force convened by the National League of Cities and the National Association of Counties in 2016, and he co-authored An Obligation to Lead, a report issued by the MMA’s Municipal Opioid Task Force in January 2016. Beckwith has an M.B.A. degree from MIT and a B.A. degree from Boston College.
Prediction
No community has been untouched by the opioid epidemic, and municipal officials are constantly confronted by the devastating losses experienced by those dealing with substance use disorder. Herculean efforts by first responders have led to widespread use of naloxone, and during the past year overdose deaths have leveled off. However, the rise of fentanyl as a heroin replacement is twisting this crisis in a deadlier direction. In 2019, naloxone will be better understood for what it is and what it is not: a drug that can bring people back from the brink of death, but not a cure and not a solution. Given fentanyl’s rise and naloxone’s limitations, the death rate will rise again without greater investment in recovery programs. We can avoid this by embracing the victims and demanding that state and federal agencies, insurers, and providers collaborate with communities to deliver the multi-disciplinary treatment and support that is necessary./p>
2019 Tip
The top job for 2019 is to destigmatize this disease. Unless residents embrace this cause, we will not be able to take the controversial steps needed to end the epidemic. Substance use disorders are difficult to treat. We have a fragmented system that provides short bursts of assistance but fails to provide the long-term support needed for successful recovery as victims re-program their brains to end the cycle of addiction. Local governments must increase housing for individuals in recovery, ensuring a safe environment to escape the grip of opioids. Communities should welcome methadone clinics—a proven medical intervention that works. Cities and towns need to provide needle exchange programs and safe usage facilities, so that fragile addicts are not shattered by devastating disease and dangerous exposures. This will be possible only if we humanize this crisis and help our neighbors see victims as worthy people who need our support.
Learn More
For a better way to measure your community’s health and well-being on topics such as the opioid epidemic, visit the City Health Dashboard.
