Kennebunkport group partners with FEMA to promote youth engagement in climate issues
Courtesy / The Climate Initiative
Leia Lowery, deputy director of the Climate Initiative in Kennebunkport, and Department of Homeland Security’s Marcus Coleman shake hands on a new youth engagement partnership.
The Climate Initiative — a climate change organization based in Kennebunkport — said it is partnering with the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency to get young people involved in issues related to climate resilience.
The two organizations signed an agreement and announced the partnership at the Climate Initiative’s third annual climate educators retreat, hosted earlier this month at the Ecology School in Saco.
“Bringing more young people into the intersecting worlds of disaster, resilience and climate change is essential as we tackle the climate crisis,” said Jono Anzalone, the Climate Initiative’s executive director.
Anzalone said the group would promote youth engagement in FEMA initiatives such as its Stories of Resilience program, which collects narratives about climate and natural hazard resilience, and its Youth Preparedness Council, created in 2012 to bring together youth leaders interested in supporting disaster preparedness, according to the agency’s website.
The Climate Initiative plans to support FEMA's efforts to promote awareness of climate-related mental health issues for youth ages 13 to 23. The initiative also will push forward FEMA’s goals of advancing climate literacy and preparing communities — including youth — to be engaged in disaster resiliency and management.
For FEMA, the partnership is part of an effort to increase climate literacy among educators, youth and leaders supporting youth and young adults, said Marcus Coleman, director for the Department of Homeland Security Center for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships.
“Increasing climate literacy of emergency managers and communities will improve disaster outcomes and long-term climate resilience through an increasingly shared understanding of climate risks and impactful mitigation opportunities,” said Coleman.
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