Through the Climate Resilient Communities Accelerator, public, private, and community stakeholders are outlining a path forward for coordinated efforts in the region. The Accelerator builds on and complements existing climate resilience programs and is designed to scale across multiple U.S. regions to elevate policy gaps and opportunities to federal lawmakers.
In the first year of the North Front Range Accelerator, C2ES worked with the Climate Adaptation Partnership at Colorado State University to host two convenings in 2023: a Climate Resilient Economies Roundtable in October and a Resources Connector Forum in November. These convenings aimed to connect communities and businesses to each other and help expand the pool of potential partners, including economic development groups, community-based organizations, NGOs, and state and federal agencies. The discussions were designed to augment local resilience efforts by uncovering strategies that can reduce the impacts of more than one climate hazard and will require action from a broad range of actors to succeed.
C2ES developed a Summary Report to capture the 2023 Accelerator convenings and process, including stakeholder engagement, current and projected wildfire and heat impacts, the shared regional vision for a prosperous future, key action areas for resilience, and opportunities to accelerate progress in the action areas.
Building on the first year’s success identifying a path forward and key action areas, the second year focuses on activating stakeholders around several key action areas and amplifying local priorities to federal policymakers. The C2ES Climate Resilient Communities Accelerator was launched with generous support from the Bank of America Charitable Foundation.