Community Task Force and City Administration to address Windsor’s priority current and future climate impacts and risks.
The Vision:
Windsor will continue to prepare for our climate future by creating a more resilient city to the effects of a changing climate. We will minimize climate change risks to our community through the advancement of sustainable policies, infrastructure investment and public education. Forward thinking and proactive actions will benefit our community health, environment and economy.
Objectives:
- Integrate Climate Change Thinking and Response
- Protect Public Health and Safety
- Reduce Risk to Buildings and Property
- Strengthen Infrastructure Resilience
- Protect Biodiversity and Enhance Ecosystem Functions
- Reduce Community Service Disruptions
- Build Community Resilience
Many of the actions identified for one impact will also provide benefits to other impacts. Therefore, in the plan, the actions identified are linked to a specific plan objective (listed above). However, these actions are also cross linked to the individual impact summaries included in the Climate Change Impacts in Windsor – A Technical Analysis attached as Appendix B.
City Council also requested that in the final plan, administration quantify the cost risk of not taking action. The draft plan includes a broad assessment of the cost of doing nothing based on a literature review along with an estimated payback for action. However, to support Council’s request an assessment was completed, where possible, for the impacts identified by administration to estimate the approximate scope of costs under the “do nothing” scenario. These costs were estimated using various data and resources available to administration. In some cases, the costs are estimated based on historical events (ex. 2016 & 2017 flood events), model projections (ex. Sewer Master Plan and East Riverside Flood Study) as well as a literature review. These costs are not to be interpreted as hard cost numbers but as a possible scope of economic cost risk under the scenarios outlined in the individual sections. The cost of doing nothing for the individual impacts can be found in the Climate Change Impacts in Windsor – A Technical Analysis (Appendix B).
City of Windsor administration and the Community Task Force identified that the success of this plan will be in part due to participation and action by the Community. Several of the proposed actions will require support from the general public including the business community. Therefore, it is important to present this draft plan to the broader community for a number of reasons including: increasing understanding of