A Resilient Houston, Calgary, and Edmonton - A Tale of Three Strategies
The City of Houston is the 101st city to join the ranks of 100 Resilient Cities. And seeing as Houston is the 101st city to join the network and it is an oil and gas centric city, I thought I’d compare its strategy to Edmonton’s and Calgary’s.
100 Resilient Cities is an initiative led by the Rockefeller foundation to create a network of member cities that are dedicated to changing the way they understand their risks and to plan for their futures. The Rockefeller Foundation provides funding, capacity building, and technical assistance to help its member cities.
According to Wikipedia, Houston’s population is just over 2 million while Calgary’s is just over a million and Edmonton is just under a million. There are many other differences that separate each city and I don’t live in two of them so I am not going to compare and judge the merits of their actions.
The purpose of this blog is to compare the structure, the information, and the ability to hold each government to account. It is also a high-level summary of what each city is focused on and how they are planning to tackle their risks.
I broke my review down and looked at the following criteria:
Document name and year published
Number of Pages
Document Purpose
Overarching Objectives
Glossary
Monitoring and Follow-up
1. Document names:
Resilient Houston – 2020
Resilient Calgary – 2019
Climate Resilient Edmonton - Adaptation Strategy and Action Plan – 2018
2. Number of Pages
I understand the length of a document does not necessarily predict its quality; however, I found it interesting that Edmonton’s was almost 100 pages shorter that Calgary’s and nearly 140 pages shorter than Houston’s.
Resilient Calgary – 142
Resilient Houston -186
Climate Resilient Edmonton - Adaptation Strategy and Action Plan - 48
3. Document Purpose
Houston placed the purpose of their document right up front in the executive summary while Calgary and Edmonton’s were a bit harder to find. Calgary and Edmonton embedded theirs within the introductions near the end of each.
Personally, I found the City of Houston’s purpose was easy to find and I found it to be a bit clearer.
Personally, I found the City of Houston’s purpose was easy to find and I found it to be a bit clearer.
4. Overarching Objectives
All three documents used different language to organize the structure of their overarching objectives, goals, and actions. Houston listed targets and Calgary listed outcomes for each of their goals. Edmonton did not have any outcome related statements.
For each, I have listed their over arching ‘objective’ and goal for each. All three city’s had detailed actions which can be referenced in each document in well organized and easy to read tables.
Other Observations
Overall, I found Calgary’s and Houston’s documents to be very similar. They both went to great lengths to:
identify measures for success,
structure accountability, and
tie their document to other strategies and plans.
Calgary and Houston did something I really liked from an accountability standpoint; they listed each community stakeholder that has a responsibility for helping them meet each action they want to achieve. Although Edmonton listed the stakeholders that were involved in their document’s development, they did not tie a community stakeholder to a goal or an action; they only list the lead city department for each action.
Calgary and Houston identified the shocks and stressors that will likely impact each goal. And Calgary was very clear in identifying their measures for success.
Houston tied each of their actions to a UN Sustainability Goal while Calgary listed the available resources for each of their actions. Given the amount of detail provided, it is very easy to understand how Calgary and Houston are moving forward to meet their goals. Edmonton stated their evaluation measures are to be developed.
Houston and Calgary provided instructions on how to read their action plan templates which I found very helpful because there is lot of data and information presented within each action page.
Calgary and Houston also provided graphics on their ‘History of Resilience’. They were good references to show what each city has faced. And they provided information on how and when they developed other strategies to address the various shocks and stressors that impact their community.
Lastly, Calgary and Houston went to great lengths to show how their resilience strategies tie into other strategies within their governments. Here is an example of how Calgary organized theirs:
Edmonton provided how they would measure climate variables which I think is important. For example, the definition for a heat wave is going to change over the decades so it is good to see Edmonton putting in criteria to determine what a hot day is, they will be able to adjust the criteria as needed, to define any new realities.
5. Glossary
I went through most definitions in each document and pulled out resilience as an example of how each city defines resilience and compared it to other sources. Houston uses the term urban resilience while Calgary and Edmonton use resilience:
6. Monitoring and Follow-up
In one way or another, all three cities are committed to monitoring and reporting progress. “The City of Edmonton intends to review and evaluate progress on the strategy annually. This will occur with the use of evaluation measures (to be developed) and through a community indicator on resilience.”
Because Calgary and Houston provided detailed plans to address each of their actions, they spoke about monitoring and reporting specific to each one, whereas, the city of Edmonton is committed to an annual report.
Conclusion
I found Calgary and Houston’s documents to be very detailed with an emphasis on accountability and measurement.
Both documents provided a clear path for how they and their stakeholders are going to address disaster resilience in each community. The city of Edmonton’s document left me with a lot of questions and a need to go searching for more detailed information.
I do look forward to reviewing each city’s reporting on their various actions in order to see how each one is gauging their current state resiliency to disasters.
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Author: Brad Ison is a professional disaster and emergency management coach. He’s held various position specific roles in the Alberta Provincial Operations Centre and had decade long career at the Alberta Emergency Management Agency where his last role served was as the Director for Training, Accreditation, and Standards.