Career Pathways in Recovery and Resilience

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

• Concrete examples of how traditional planning skill sets are being used within disaster-recovery and community-resilience efforts
• New career pathways for planning professionals
• What resilience planning entails for both municipal (city and county) planners and those in private practice

MORE SESSION DETAILS

The value of traditional planning skills and expertise is being realized in new ways within the arenas of disaster recovery and community resilience. Holistic recovery and resilience requires a thorough understanding of a community’s past, present, and future conditions and the application of a thoughtful, analytical approach to examining a community’s strengths, challenges, and opportunities. As the federal government further incentivizes communities to incorporate resilience into their recovery efforts, private firms are diversifying their service offerings to include the economic-development, housing, transportation, and community-development skill sets that professional planners have. Examples of this changing landscape can be seen in Shelby County, Tenn., where city and county planners led the development of the Mid-South Greenprint, a 25-year plan to create a network of greenways and bike paths across three states that served as the foundation for the county’s successful application for federal resilience funding; in New Orleans, where planners have been brought in to the city’s new Office of Resilience and Sustainability to lead stormwater-management efforts; and in Springfield, Mass., where planners supported the design of a recovery program focused on creating safe, healthy, and affordable rental units.