Tagged With "Health in All Policies"
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12 Myths of the Science of ACEs
The two biggest myths about ACEs science are: MYTH #1 — That it’s just about the 10 ACEs in the ACE Study — the CDC-Kaiser Permanente Adverse Childhood Experiences Study . It’s about sooooo much more than that. MYTH #2 — And that it’s just about ACEs…adverse childhood experiences. These two myths are intertwined. The ACE Study issued the first of its 70+ publications in 1998, and for many people it was the lightning bolt, the grand “aha” moment, the unexpected doorway into a blazing new...
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2019 Beyond Paper Tigers Conference Series - Why Take Course One and Course Two?
Community Resilience Initiative is officially launching a new series of blog posts, building to our 2019 Beyond Paper Tigers conference on June 25th - 27th. We’ll cover a range of topics relevant to conference material, events, and inspirations. In addition to the regular conference, CRI is offering two training add-on options on Tuesday June 25, 2019 prior to the conference: Resilience-Based Trainings, Course One and Two . https://criresilient.org/beyon...re-conference-event/ “A group of...
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5 things people are doing to help the victims of the California fires.(upworthy.com)
On Sunday night, flames swept into Santa Rosa and other cities across the region with little warning . At least 24 people have been confirmed dead , with hundreds displaced and nearly 300 still reported missing . Meanwhile, hundreds of residents from hotel owners to teachers and students to local government officials to relief workers are marshalling help those to affected. Here's what they've been up to in the days since the devastation began. 1. Farms are taking in displaced animals, and...
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8 Lessons for Building Resiliency After the California Wildfires
From City Lab: By RICHARD HEINBERG NOV 1, 2017 We need to get smarter before the next major disaster. My wife Janet and I voluntarily evacuated our house in Santa Rosa, California, at 4 a.m. on October 10. We live just outside a mandatory evacuation zone, but we opted to retreat from the wildfires raging nearby when we saw a bright orange glow on the horizon and a billowing plume of black smoke—both apparently headed our way. That morning, we bundled our four sleepy hens into the back of our...
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A Climate Change Inspired Poem (sandiegofreepress.org)
As a girl by herself wandering wantonly within the woods, I was kept company By animal voices and ancient whispers from the tree canopy When my bare feet touched warm soil, planted firmly on earth, I was so aware I was never alone, I belonged to this mystic beauty, and happily had not a care Yet by the time I was a young woman, ready to journey from my home The animal voices, many were going quiet it was well known Our overpopulated and ever multiplying numbers, an occupying parasite upon...
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How a natural disaster led one town to do something about its ACEs, past and future
Tracy Franke, principal of Darrington Elementary School, a K-8 school with 300 students, had heard about CLEAR, and called Dr. Christopher Blodgett, who runs the program, to arrange a visit from Turner. “We were hurting,” says Franke. “Our students and staff needed some tools to get through the trauma.”
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How a story about childhood trauma in Paradise became one of community trauma [centerforhealthjournalism.org]
My project for the Center for Health Journalism’s California Fellowship was focused on childhood trauma, zeroing in on a town in Northern California. In the fall, that town — Paradise, California — burned in a harrowing wildfire. The story quickly changed to one of community loss. The story of trauma in two counties My initial project was about Adverse Childhood Experiences, or ACEs. ACEs are one way to quantify how much childhood trauma a person has experienced before the age of 18. Through...
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How Climate Experts Think About Raising Children Who Will Inherit a Planet in Crisis [washingtonpost.com]
By Caitlin Gibson, The Washington Post, February 14, 2020 I n the midst of a winter that hasn’t felt much like one, as the coldest temperatures retreated to the highest latitudes, Jedediah Britton-Purdy carried his 5-month-old son, James, outside their home in New York City to bask in the unseasonable warmth. As a professor of environmental law at Columbia University, Britton-Purdy was acutely aware of the ominous implications of the city’s record highs. As a new father, what was there to do...
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How Communities Can Build Psychological Resilience to Disaster
Nicole Wetsman The Red River runs north, up along the border between North Dakota and Minnesota, before spilling into Lake Winnipeg in Manitoba, Canada. Its water flows slowly through a 10,000-year-old glacial lakebed, in one of the flattest stretches of land in the United States, and because it points north, it’s sometimes blocked by ice jams—all of which makes the river prone to flooding . In March 2009, one such flood threatened the city of Fargo. Residents watched for a week as the...
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How Parents and Teachers Can Calm Kids' Getty Fire Anxiety [latimes.com]
By Sonali Kohli and Nina Agrawal, Los Angeles Times, October 29, 2019 During this Santa Ana wind season, 12-year-old Nicholas Ladesich tends to go to bed worrying about what might burn overnight. He often has dreams of waking up in his old house that burned down in the Woolsey fire last year. But he awakens instead in the living room of the one-bedroom guest house he shares with his brother and parents. He demands that his mom turn on the news to monitor possible fires while his 15-year-old...
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How Scientists are Coping With 'Ecological Grief' [theguardian.com]
By Gaia Vince, The Guardian, January 12, 2020 Melting glaciers, coral reef death, wildlife disappearance, landscape alteration, climate change: our environment is transforming rapidly, and many of us are experiencing a sense of profound loss. Now, the scientists whose work it is to monitor and document this extraordinary change are beginning to articulate the emotional tsunami sweeping over the field, which they’re naming “ecological grief”. Researchers are starting to form support groups...
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How the Mental Health Community Is Bracing for the Impact of Climate Change “Eco-anxiety” and trauma from natural disasters will be on the rise along with sea levels
Rolling Stone, May 16, 2019 By Andrea Marks When San Francisco broke heat records in 2017, with 106-degree temperatures in September, psychiatrist Robin Cooper didn’t hear until after the fact that one of her patients had been feeling dizzy and feverish. One day, he’d fainted in his poorly ventilated workspace. Emergency room doctors had surmised he’d had a virus. But Cooper warned him it could actually be a drug she’d prescribed him interacting with the extreme heat. Certain antipsychotic...
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How To Customize Your Email Notifications for ACEs Connection ITRC Community
A number of people have asked if and how they can limit the number of emails they receive from this ACEs Connection Network platform. YES, it is easy to do and the directions are below: Go to Your Name in upper top right navigation bar. Click Notifications in the drop-down menu. To suspend all emails from the main site and all community sites you've joined, select the Settings box, check the box for Suspend All Email Notifications , scroll to the bottom and click on Update Settings . To...
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How to help children recover from the trauma of disaster [theconversation.com]
In any culture, children hit by a natural disaster will see family members undergo huge amounts of stress and worry. They may be forced to live in temporary accommodation, and experience many changes to their usual routines and social circles. And on top of all this, many treasured possessions – including family pets – may be lost or damaged forever. For many children, this can result in high levels of anxiety and emotional trauma . This can inevitably lead to changes in a child’s behaviour,...
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How Two Local Communities Are Fighting Back Against the Trauma of Global Climate Change
In Alertnet: February 24, 2018 By Ruben Cantu, program manager for community trauma, mental health and violence prevention at Prevention Institute , and ITRC Steering Committee Member Found at: https://www.alternet.org/environment/global-climate-change-causing-local-trauma-heres-how-two-communities- We must build resilient communities before disaster strikes. Communities around the globe are feeling the effects of climate change, from scorching heat waves and out-of-control wildfires to...
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Hurricane Florence first responders receive free trauma/resilience training
In a webinar offered this morning by Elaine Miller Karas , executive director of the Trauma Resource Institute in Claremont, CA, leaders from several North Carolina ACEs Connection communities affected by flooding and other damage by Hurricane Florence learned more about trauma response and how to better help their communities find resilience. Karas, who was delivering her Community Resiliency Model (CRM) training at Duke University in Durham, NC, offered the free training and provided...
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Hurricane Michael: Children Face Stress Of Upended Lives [health.wusf.usf.edu]
When Tiffany Harris and her two children emerged from their hotel after Hurricane Michael roared past, her 3-year-old son pointed to a sea of fallen trees and shattered buildings. "It's broken. It's broken, Mommy, fix it," she recalls her little boy Amari begging. Harris, who lives with her boyfriend, two children, plus her sister and her four children near Panama City, soon learned their town house was uninhabitable. Everything was a total loss after Michael powered inland across the...
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'I don't feel real': Mental stress mounting after Michael [wjla.com]
PANAMA CITY, Fla. (AP) — Amy Cross has a hard time explaining the stress of living in a city that was splintered by Hurricane Michael . She's fearful after hearing gunshots at night, and she's confused because she no longer recognizes the place where she's spent her entire 45 years. "I just know I don't feel real, and home doesn't feel like home at all," Cross said. Health workers say they are seeing signs of mental problems in residents more than a week after Michael, and the issues could...
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ITRC Announces Fall 2019 Free Webinars on Building Transformational Resilience for Climate Traumas
To Register for Any of the Webinars Below Go to the Link on ITRC Website: http://www.theresourceinnovationgroup.org/ Introduction to Transformational Resilience for Climate Traumas Date : Thursday, October 31 from 12 noon--1 pm Pacific Time (3-4 pm Eastern Time) Although it is difficult to accept, humanity is in the midst of a civilization changing event. The more frequent and extreme disasters and toxic stresses generated by human-induced climate disruption are aggravating the existing...
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ITRC Announces Spring 2020 Free 1 Hr. Webinars
Introduction to Transformational Resilience for Climate Traumas, Toxic Stresses, and Other Emergencies Date : Thursday, April 30 from 12 noon--1 pm Pacific Time (3-4 pm Eastern Time) Click here to register for this webinar The Coronavirus pandemic is causing significant stress and disorientation. The adversities provide a glimpse of the personal mental health and collective psycho-social-spiritual problems that will emerge as the climate emergency worsens. Although it is difficult to accept,...
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ITRC calls for Universal Resilience Education and Skills Training for Climate Trauma
Sneak Preview for ITRC ACEs Connection Members! Next Tuesday, Jan. 8, the ITRC will release a major report Preparing People on the West Coast for Climate Change. The media release about the report is below (and attached). It includes a link to the webpage for the report, where people can download the full report, and find a link to the webpage with examples of resilience programs across the west coast. You can connect with the ITRC CA and PNW Facebook page:...
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ITRC Issues Call to Action To Make Transformational Resilience Education and Skills-Training Universal by 2025
With the disasters and toxic stresses generated by rising temperatures accelerating worldwide, the ITRC has issued a call for psychological and psycho-social-spiritual--or Transformational Resilience--to be made available to all adults and youth in the U.S. and internationally by 2025. Click here to read the call to action.
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ITRC Asks ACEs Professionals to Sign Call To Action on Climate Change Emergency
All ACEs professionals asked to Sign the Call to Action to rapidly build psychological and psycho-social-spiritual-- or transformational--resilience to prevent widespread climate traumas! Attached is the complete Call to Action to Build Human Resilience for Climate Traumas or find it at the ITRC website: http://www.theresourceinnovationgroup.org/ Individuals wanting to sign the Call to Action to Build Human Resilience for Climate Traumas click here or paste url into browser Organizations...
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Climate change fueling disasters, disease in ‘potentially irreversible’ ways, report warns [WashingtonPost.com]
Water vapor rises from the coal-fired power plant run by the energy company LEAG in Boxberg, Germany. (Singer/Epa-Efe/Rex/Shutterstock) Climate change significantly imperils public health globally, according to a new report that chronicles the many hazards and symptoms already being seen. The authors describe its manifestations as “unequivocal and potentially irreversible.” Heat waves are striking more people, disease-carrying mosquitoes are spreading and weather disasters are becoming more...
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Last Chance to Sign the ITRC Call to Action on the Climate Change Mental Health and Psycho-Social-Spiritual Emergency
ITRC and ACEs Connection Network Members: Please sign the ITRC Call to Action! To Sign the ITRC Call to Action go here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1eMCXe-ttFjGllMiFtFwiZvJEFKix2uowzEGbVrKGCM8/edit To Read the ITRC Call to Action go here: http://www.theresourceinnovationgroup.org/ In response to the accelerating personal and collective traumas caused by climate disruption and as a follow up to the U.S. Call to Action in Climate, Health, and Equity priority 9 to build resilient...
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Making the Connections Between Climate Change and Sexual and Relationship Violence
“Human relations were laid bare and the strengths and weaknesses in relationships came sharply into focus. Thus, socially isolated women became more isolated, domestic violence increased, and the core of relationships with family, friends and spouses were exposed” – written in response to a major flood in Australia (Dobson, 1994, p. 11). Racism. Sexism. Classism. Immigration status. Violence against LGBTQ communities. These are just a few of the various forms of oppression that the...
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MENTAL TOLL OF CLIMATE CHANGE HITS WOMEN 60% MORE
in OZY, By Stephen Starr July 25, 2019 https://www.ozy.com/acumen/mental-toll-of-climate-change-hits-women-60-more/94796 It’s long been argued that climate change will see our cities flooded, our forests reduced to ash and our weather turn increasingly violent and unpredictable. But research has found that the downside of living in a hotter, less-climate-stable world may not be limited only to buildings, trees and weather: A recently released report suggests climate change may actually...
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More Than 11,000 Scientists Just Officially Declared a Global Climate Emergency
NOTE TO ITRC MEMBERS : The official declaration of a climate emergency reinforces the reality that we are also in the midst of a climate change-driven mental health and psycho-social-spiritual emergency . Business-as-usual in the mental health and social service fields remains the dominant response (e.g. trauma treatment). We must make prevention the top priority and focus on building widespread capacity for Transformational Resilience. Bob Doppelt by Carly Cassella 5 NOV 2019 A massive...
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New Resources from the Mycelium Youth Network [myceliumyouthnetwork.org]
By Mycelium Youth Network, May 2020 Mycelium Youth Network prepares youth in the Bay Area -- who are most vulnerable to and already feeling the effects of environmental racism -- for climate change. We use a merger of indigenous environmental traditions that emphasize youth environmental stewardship and relationship building alongside a rigorous STEAM curriculum that focuses on practical hands-on skills for climate resilience and mitigation that youth create and implement in their homes and...
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New York Life and Change in Mind Institute at the Alliance for Strong Families and Communites Partner on Grant Program to Support Communities Impacted by Disaster
WASHINGTON, D.C., June 1, 2018 – New York Life Insurance Company and the Alliance for Strong Families and Communities today announced the launch of a new grant program to support children, adults, families, and communities experiencing trauma resulting from natural disaster or community-wide tragedy. The partnership will serve as the first-ever disaster-focused grant for the New York Life Foundation, the charitable arm of the company. The program, Building Resilience in the Face of Disaster,...
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‘None of us will ever be the same’: Survivors of 2017 Tubbs Fire face long-term trauma [Sacramento Bee]
BY PANCHALAY CHALERMKRAIVUTH pchalermkraivuth@sacbee.com August 3, 2019 Robert “Priest” Morgan hasn’t slept without a cocktail of pills since the night he says God kicked him in the head to wake him up – the night he opened the front door of his Santa Rosa mobile home to see a fire engine, a few people running up and down Sahara Street and screaming. “The sky looked like the Fourth of July,” he said. “The entire park except for my street was an inferno.” It wasn’t Independence Day – it was...
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Oregon bill takes preventive approach to psycho-social-spiritual impacts of climate change
A hearing will be held on April 3 on a recently introduced bill ( SB 1037 ) to create a task force to determine how to make resilience training available to all Oregonians in response to climate change. Under the bill, an 18-member task force would be created to study aspects of psychological, emotional, and psychosocial resilience education and skills training. The Oregon members of the International Transformation Resilience Coalition (ITRC), including ITRC coordinator, Bob Doppelt, have...
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OUR FUTURE AFTER THE FIRE: NON-PROFIT DONATES $1 MILLION TO HELP FIRST RESPONDERS WITH TRAUMA (Action News)
By Jafet Serrato, Oct 24, 2019, for Action News BUTTE COUNTY, Calif. - The North Valley Community Foundation has been working on choosing where vital grant money should go after the Camp Fire. David Little is the executive vice president of the organization. "We are both giving direct assistance to fire survivors who need it, through our partners on the ground but also giving to agencies who need help in the longer term," Little said. The Butte County Sheriff's Office is one of those...
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Our Hearts and Mind Are With The People Impacted by Hurricane Florence
Hurricane Florence is just one of the latest reminders of the more intense disasters a warming planet creates that can produce significant adverse psychological and psycho-social-spiritual impacts. The ITRC sends its deepest sympathies to all the people impacted by the storm. You are all in our thoughts. We also send our great thanks to the many individuals and organizations that are helping others deal with the distressing events-- including first responders, public health, mental health,...
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Post from Emily Watson Seeking Personal and Organizational Resilience Indicators and Enhancing
Hello! I work for The Cadmus Group and am responsible for implementing our integrated sustainability and resilience policy. One area that I'm focusing on because of the importance of transformational resilience for all of our employees is identifying personal resilience indicators that I can work with my HR leadership to integrate into our performance measures. This will help encourage our employees to enhance their own resilience, ultimately enhancing the resilience and connectedness of...
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Post-wildfire report on nonprofit services: mental health a critical need, services to most vulnerable citizens impacted
At the end of 2017, Community Foundation of Sonoma County and Napa Valley Community Foundation enlisted the Center for Effective Philanthropy to conduct a survey of local nonprofit organizations about the impacts of the wildfires on the people they serve and on their organizational capacity to provide services in response. While reading CEP Advisory Services " 2018 Wildfire Response Survey " report through an ACEs and trauma-informed lens, the following findings jumped out at me: 1. Mental...
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Preparing People for Climate Change in California (Oakland, CA) - Early Bird Discount Ends on November 15th
To see the conference agenda, list of all-star speakers, and to register go to: http://www.theresourceinnovationgroup.org/california-2018-conference/
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Preparing People for Climate Change in California: Sonoma County Listens and Shares
Last summer Bob Doppelt asked me to join a planning committee for a conference on climate change . I was surprised to be asked as my recent professional expertise is tied to addressing childhood adversity. Bob changed my perspective on the relevance by saying, "Adversity and trauma are the social side effects of climate-related disasters. Imagine the social-emotional impacts on Katrina survivors." The connection was a glimmer in my mind, but I agreed to support a California conference .
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Public Health Matters Blog Posts: Using trauma-informed care to guide emergency preparedness and response
"Exposure to a traumatic event or set of circumstances can negatively affect a person’s mental, physical, social, emotional or spiritual well-being for a long time after the initial incident. We know that not all individuals respond to trauma in the same way and we know that individuals with a history of trauma, especially childhood trauma, are more likely to experience psychological distress and are at increased risk for the development of Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) with future...
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Recommendations for preventing & healing pandemic generated mental health and psychosocial problems
Attached is a set of ITRC recommendations for swiftly organizing community-based initiatives to prevent and heal pandemic-generated mental health and psychosocial problems. If you find the recommendations helpful, please initiate the creation of a resilience coordinating council in your community or region. Please also pass the document on to other organizations and individuals that might find it useful. Thanks--and stay healthy during this stressful time, Bob Doppelt
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Resources on Some Mental Health Organization Responses to Climate Change
After a recent ITRC Steering committee meeting, member Dr. David Pollack sent the following resources ITRC members might be interested in: Climate Psychiatry Alliance (CPA) website, recently launched and which will hopefully be updated regularly with lots of useful information about climate and mental health issues, including the slide presentations we have been putting on at various meetings, brief summaries of key issues, etc. www.climatepsychiatry. org Medical Society Consortium on...
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Rising from the Ashes: How Trauma-Informed Care Nurtures Healing in Rural America [The Rural Monitor]
By Jenn Lukens April 17, 2019 It was late July 2018 when the Mendocino Complex wildfire broke out in rural Lake County, California. It burned more than 450,000 acres and destroyed 280 structures before it was contained. Ana Santana managed to fill some storage bins with sentimental items – her kids’ blankets, pictures, and art projects – before fleeing her home. Santana is the facilitator of the Lake County Children’s Council and Program Director for Healthy Start Youth and Family Services ,...
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Sesame Street Resources for Families Coping After Natural Disasters
In the aftermath of recent hurricanes and wildfires, the Sesame Street in Communities team wanted to reach out to provide information on our available resources to help families cope in the aftermath of natural disasters, and other traumatic experiences. Bilingual videos, articles, printables and more, are all available for free on our website at www.sesamestreetincommunities.org . Here are the links to a few topic pages that may be most useful to you as you work with families in the...
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Sonoma County Resiliency Collaborative A Practical Approach to Post-Wildlife Resilience and Wellbeing
The traumatic events of the North Bay wildfires affect our emotional and physical health, social functioning, and overall well-being, both as individuals and as a community. Unresolved, they can damage our health and limit our potential to rebuild a strong community. Join diverse Sonoma County leaders and representatives to participate in dynamic workshop where you will practice tools for effectively addressing personal and team stress after the fires, network with peers, and learn about an...
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Sonoma County’s parklands are already showing signs of recovery from fire (sonomanews.com)
Nearly every tree species affected by the Tubbs and Nuns fires has a strategy for returning. Some, such as coast live oak, have thick bark and may still be standing with green canopies hanging over blackened understory in places such as Sonoma Valley Regional Park. Trees in this condition will be helped in the years to come because the competition around their bases is gone. If burned, coast live oak have an amazing ability to sprout from the trunk. This can happen as quickly as two months...
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The Best Medicine for My Climate Grief [yesmagazine.org]
Sometimes a wave of climate grief breaks over me. It happens unexpectedly, perhaps during a book talk, or while on the phone with a congressional representative. In a millisecond, without warning, I’ll feel my throat clench, my eyes sting, and my stomach drop as though the Earth below me is falling away. During these moments, I feel with excruciating clarity everything that we’re losing—but also connection and love for those things. Usually I don’t mind the grief. It’s clarifying. It makes...
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The Capital Region Climate Readiness Collaborative (CRC) first Quarterly Adaptation Exchange in 2018
The Capital Region Climate Readiness Collaborative (CRC) conducted our first Quarterly Adaptation Exchange in 2018 on how Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and trauma can be a detriment to an individual’s physical, social, and mental health that has lasting effects into adulthood. Climate impacts and an individual’s and/or community’s capacity to respond to trauma with resilience is intrinsically tied to access to a support system, resources, and past traumas. The reality is with Climate...
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The Case of Juliana v. U.S. — Children and the Health Burdens of Climate Change [NEJM.org]
Renee N. Salas, M.D., M.P.H., Wendy Jacobs, J.D., and Frederica Perera, Dr.P.H., Ph.D. On June 4, 2019, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals will hear oral arguments in Juliana v. United States to determine whether the case will proceed to trial in district court in Oregon. Nearly 4 years ago, 21 children and adolescents between 8 and 19 years of age, including Kelsey Juliana from Oregon, filed suit against the federal government, charging that the government’s inaction on addressing climate...
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The Promise of Post-Traumatic Growth Part II
Read "The Promise of Post-Traumatic Growth Part I" here . What do you imagine post-traumatic growth looks like? Feeling stronger in the face of a new challenge, knowing we’ve already overcome the worst that life can throw at us? Being more grateful for the little things? More connected to our friends and family? Finding new perspective and priorities? Or maybe having a deeper sense of the mystery and sanctity of life? The answer is all of the above. In the first part of our article “ The...
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This is what our cities need to do to be truly liveable for all [theconversation.com]
Urban planners, governments and developers are increasingly interested in making cities “liveable”. But what features contribute to liveability? Which areas in cities are the least and most liveable? The various liveability rankings – where Australia tends to do quite well – don’t provide much useful guidance. In a recently released report, Creating Liveable Cities in Australia , our team defined and produced the first baseline measure of liveability in Australia’s capital cities. We broke...