County Commissioners Protecting America's Natural Resources 

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Climate Change

"Within a handful of decades, climate in many parts of the United States is expected to be significantly warmer than even the warmest years of the 20th century, increasing the risk of drought, flooding, forest fires, disease, and other impacts across many regions.

Public decision makers have a critical opportunity – and a need – to start preparing today for the impacts of climate change. Preparing for climate change is not a “one size fits all” process, however. Just as the impacts of climate change will vary from place to place, the combination of institutions and legal and political tools available to public decision-makers are unique from region to region. Preparedness actions will need to be tailored to the circumstances of different communities.

Preparing for Climate Change: A Guidebook for Local, Regional, and State Governments is designed to help local, regional, and state governments prepare for climate change by recommending a detailed, easy-to-understand process for climate change preparedness based on familiar resources and tools."

You can access this useful guidebook, produced by the Climate Impacts Group, by clicking here.

The Conservation Leaders Network is the new home for Cool Counties. Moving from the King County WA website, which was its original home, the Cool Counties web pages will be kept up-to-date as more and more counties endorse the Cool Counties Climate Stabilization Declaration.

See the Cool Counties Climate Stabilization Declaration and help get your county to endorse it! 

Launched at the National Association of Counties' annual conference in Richmond  VA in July, 2008, it calls for a commitment to reduce global warming emissions 80 percent by 2050. Click here to read the Declaration. Click here to read about the Launch.

The newest Cool Counties are:

• Broward County  FL
• Wakulla County  Fl
• Orange County  NC
• San Miguel County  CO
• Lackawanna County  PA
• Boulder County  CO
• Benton County  OR

This is a message that we believe county officials will respond to right now.  But before they will respond, they need to hear the message, they need responses and solutions placed before them in ways that resonate with county officials, they need help advocating for the changes that need to take place.

While we believe this should be handled at the federal level, we also know that it isn’t going to happen.  Some states have begun to address the issue but many county officials recognize that they need to step up to the plate and take a leadership role.  The Conservation Leaders Network can help them do just that.

The Conservation Leaders Network works with county officials to protect America’s natural resources.  It has become clear that as important as the many individual resource protection issues are, they pale in comparison to the effect global warming will have on America’s natural resources.

The National Association of Counties finally adopted a position on global warming at the Legislative Conference in March.  The Conservation Leaders Network was instrumental in its success.  Three county commissioners from three different states were planning to introduce resolutions unbeknownst to each other.   But we knew about each of them and were able to bring them together to develop a strategy and language that succeeded.

The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) has very informative material on their website.  NRDC uses law, science, and the support of more than 1 million members and online activists to protect the planet's wildlife and wild places and to ensure a safe and healthy environment for all living things.  NRDC's website provides a wealth of environmental information as well as state-of-the-art online activism tools.  You can find information about and global warming on the NRDC website by clicking on this link.

To see the handout, Global Warming Impacts on Forests, that we passed out at the NACo Conference, click here.

The Conservation Leaders Network is working hard to raise the money needed to get global warming information out to counties.  To join or make a donation, click here.
 

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Masthead photo credits: Rolf Sklar, Curtis J. Carley FWS, NOAA