This week Massachusetts rolled out a statewide strategy to help coastal communities protect residents, strengthen local infrastructure, and safeguard natural resources.
Deanna Moran is the state’s Chief Coastal Resilience Officer. She says the ResilientCoasts Plan outlines a whole-government approach.
“This is not a plan that's intended to be implemented or owned by the environmental agencies or CZM [Coastal Zone Management],” Moran said. “You know, it really is a joint responsibility across state government to see that these actions are put into place. And we've been working really collaboratively with all of our sister agencies and secretariats on that.”
The plan breaks the state’s coastline into 15 Coastal Resilience Districts, to promote regional collaboration. There are five separate districts on the Cape and Islands. Moran says the plan is rooted in work happening on the local level.
“This really is a first of its kind plan in terms of the scale that we are planning at across our 1,500 miles of coastline,” she said. “And our real focus with ResilientCoasts is scaling up the work that's happening across our 98 cities and towns to the regional and district scale to be more efficient and stretch those dollars further.”
Massachusetts Coastal Zone Management Director Alison Brizius agreed it makes economic sense for the state to partner with coastal communities.
“One dollar of investment gives us back at least $13 in economic benefit and that number just keeps going up,” she added. “So this is not just good for the environment, this is smart for our communities, and so we're looking to help them do this work however we can.”
The 50-year plan outlines near-term, medium-term and long-term actions.
