Cities Take Charge In Crisis Response Measures

"The green movement in Cleveland isn't confined to just a few, visible projects. A sustainability mindset has taken root in the city and county governments. Faced with the continuing loss of industrial jobs, officials are realizing that economic development needs to focus on things like alternative energy, resource efficiency, and quality of place.

[In New York City], "All Together Now" has been a pilot program...to scale the emergency preparedness tactics from the family and building level to the block level and eventually the entire city...other major cities in the country are considering the adoption of All Together Now.

'One of the key things we're learning is that we have to strengthen our neighborhoods,' says Gwendolyn Hallsmith, director of Global Community Initiatives, a Montpelier, Vermont-based group that does sustainability planning with cities. 'Because if they don't have inner resiliency, connectivity, communications, there's nothing government can do to help. Government will never be able to be the only response for a disaster like Katrina. We need to depend on each other, too.'

What does it mean to be resilient? According to Hallsmith, it means having 'an adaptive capacity rather than just the skills and training of emergency response...the ability of a system to adapt to change, to be able to respond to disturbances, surprises, shocks, and uncertainty.'"