Baltimore City Council takes step toward combating climate change, requests report
BALTIMORE -- Baltimore City officials now have six months to submit a report on how Baltimore can establish a local climate resilience authority, according to a bill introduced by Councilman Mark Conway.
That bill passed on Wednesday afternoon. Conway said it's a step toward making Baltimore more resilient to future climate events.
"There are neighborhoods in Baltimore in which we've had literal buses floating down the street because our infrastructure can no longer handle some storms that we've been experiencing," Conway said.
Climate resilience authorities focus on financing climate resilience projects like flood barriers and stormwater infrastructure.
"We know we have to do something about it, but we only have so many dollars to pay for that. We have tight budgets," Conway said. "So how do we find the funding? The hope is that with a resilience authority, we can still leverage the city's bonding authority and still have an eligibility to apply for non-profit grants and otherwise."
Some of these authorities have already been established in Charles County and Anne Arundel County. In Baltimore, Conway talked about the kinds of projects the authority would help fund.
"Increasing our stormwater retention capacity in various neighborhoods throughout the city," Conway said. "Investments in our waterfront to make sure that as sea levels rise, we don't see impacts to our business on the waterfront."
Conway mentioned planting shade trees to alleviate the heat in neighborhoods that need it most, too.
"The ability for a resilience authority is pretty broad and I think we want to figure out, given the things we know we want to achieve, what makes the most sense as far as its structure," Conway said.
Baltimore County is exploring the concept of a climate resilience authority, too.