New Publication Covers Tools, Risks Related toCoastal Hazards and Social Vulnerability

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Lisa Schiavinato, 919-513-1895, lisa_schiavinato@ncsu.edu

Posted Tuesday, June 16, 2015

The North Carolina Coastal Resources, Law, Planning and Policy Center is offering a publication for local government officials whose communities are dealing with extreme weather events and increased flooding.

The paper, titled “Mapping Coastal Risks and Social Vulnerability: Current Tools and Legal Risks,” outlines the available data sets for social vulnerability, their current and potential use, and the associated legal risks in using that information for adaptation planning. It is part of a larger project about the law and policy issues associated with mapping social vulnerability that was funded jointly by North Carolina and Virginia Sea Grant programs.

Lisa Schiavinato, co-director of the Center and Sea Grant law, policy and community development specialist, is a co-author, with Heather Payne, from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s School of Law Center for Law, Environment, Adaptation, and Resources, or UNC CLEAR.

Together with the companion publication from the Virginia Coastal Policy Center at William & Mary Law School, “Mapping Coastal Risks and Social Vulnerability: Principles and Considerations,” these documents examine whether and how social vulnerability indices should inform policies in North Carolina and Virginia related to coastal flooding and sea-level rise.

“We hope that these publications can start a conversation on whether mapping social vulnerability is right for a community; and if so, what tools are available that would allow a local government to create a process that makes mapping a community effort,” Schiavinato says.

This research is intended to lay the groundwork to inform future work to integrate social vulnerability in adaptation planning that can meet the specific needs to rural and urban areas in both states.

The team consisted of representatives from North Carolina and Virginia. Members were from North Carolina and Virginia Sea Grant programs, the Center, UNC CLEAR, and Virginia Coastal Policy Center.

Read the white papers here:

• “Mapping Coastal Risks and Social Vulnerability: Current Tools and Legal Risks” at https://ncseagrant.ncsu.edu/ncseagrant_docs/products/2010s/SOVI_Tools_Risks.pdf
• “Mapping Coastal Risks and Social Vulnerability: Principles and Considerations” at http://law.wm.edu/academics/programs/jd/electives/clinics/vacoastal/reports/SOVI-%20Priciples%20and%20Considerations.pdf

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