Invest in expanded, culturally-sensitive, collaborative and sustained engagement efforts that connect local climate change issues and solutions to related community-identified urgent needs and long-term challenges.

STRATEGIES

EC-3.1 Allocate operating budget and staff resources to support sustained community outreach and engagement. Ensure grant applications incorporate budget for such activities. Develop feasible mechanisms and channels to provide compensation to partners as appropriate.

EC-3.2 Develop and promote multiple avenues and points of entry to bolster people and communities for collective civic engagement and community action on climate change issues. This could include hosting in-person or virtual public meetings or town halls, hosting charrettes and workshops, community listening sessions, presentations, tabling at public events, arts initiatives, and creating communications campaigns that engage residents through multiple channels to maintain and create open dialogues. Attend events that the community is already hosting/has already scheduled.

EC-3.3 Understand and integrate best practices, tools and resources for equitable outreach, engagement and enhanced literacy, such as but not limited to “The Spectrum of Community Engagement.”

EC-3.4 Partner with trusted community leaders/messengers in frontline communities to co-create outreach strategies and engagement tools that reflect the culture, values and priorities of the community.

EC-3.5 Include equity accommodations for communications, outreach and engagement, such as interpreters, captions on virtual meetings, providing multiple meeting times, providing childcare, utilizing multiple mediums and compensating participants as appropriate.