Community-Centered Climate Planning

Problem, research strategy, and findingsPlaces around the world already experience significant damage from climate change–related weather events, economic disruption, and health impacts, exacerbated by poverty, segregation, and inequitable infrastructure. Unfortunately, Texas provides a perfect illustration of these forces, with impacts made even more severe by a lack of climate planning. How can planners minimize harm and reduce risk, given the state leadership’s unwillingness to undertake climate planning? One place to start is to investigate residents’ climate change beliefs to understand whether they share the state’s climate antagonism and then use this information to shape a planning response. In this study, I analyzed a survey (n = 1,053) to ask: What are Texans’ perceptions of climate change, and how can planners use this knowledge to create strategies to catalyze climate planning? Respondents expressed strong agreement about negative effects of climate change and increased frequency of extreme weather. They believed that climate change is due at least in part to human activity, and they expressed robust support for climate-related planning activities. These responses sharply differ from the state’s approach. However, despite agreement about climate issues, respondents did not identify climate change as a major concern about the future. This contrast suggests an opportunity for new climate-related communication frames to bridge the gap between climate perceptions and planning action.Takeaway for practiceThese findings inform three recommendations: better connect climate change impacts to everyday concerns, including housing, air quality, and health; emphasize common ground about benefits provided by nature, especially related to health; and use community engagement to refine these frames. I propose that planners can accelerate climate planning by following the lead of other disciplines that emphasize human health impacts of the climate crisis. In addition, planners can strengthen climate planning by extending environmental planning’s use of local knowledge from environmental health, urban heat planning, and climate-related land use planning to climate planning more broadly.