City of Phoenix Environment Program;

As the southwestern United States moves into an increasingly different climate than anything we’ve experienced in the modern era, elected officials, city managers, urban sustainability officers, planners, and resource managers are facing decisions that are likely to benefit from insights that emerge from ongoing climate science, impacts research, and promising adaptation practices. In an effort to both inform these decisions and learn from these important stakeholders in Arizona, this project seeks to create a collaborative environment among stakeholders and climate researchers to stimulate and support climate adaptation and resiliency efforts across the state. The project has three goals: 1) provide useful, state-of-the-art climate knowledge to municipal leaders to encourage using climate science in long-range decision processes; 2) work with urban managers and planners to develop tangible products and/or processes that will help planners and decision makers incorporate climate information into their unique planning documents and policies; 3) study the process of engagement and results from the collaboration to contribute to the growing literature about best practices for climate change adaptation.