Media Advisory: Climate Change -- Its Impact on WNY Planning and Policy Making

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- The impact of climate change on local planning and policymaking in the Buffalo-Niagara Falls metropolitan area will be the subject of a free public talk April 13 by Himanshu Grover, PhD, assistant professor of urban and regional planning in the University at Buffalo School of Architecture and Planning and a specialist in the field.

Grover will speak from 12:30-2 p.m. in 9 Norton Hall, UB North Campus. Lunch will be served, but reservations for lunch are required (RSVP to CeppRSVP@buffalo.edu).

Grover says, "Even though reliable scientific data confirms the increasing rate of climate variability and change due to global warming, there remains a distinct lack of attention to climate change in local environmental and development planning.

"One of the major reasons identified for this lack of concern," he says, "is the inability of local decision-makers to effectively understand and use the climate change information available to them."

Grover will present the results of a recent survey of decision-makers in Buffalo-Niagara metropolitan region that was undertaken to ascertain how sensitive they are to issues of climate variability and change, and if so, what is their focus -- mitigation or adaptation? He will also look at what factors influence the role of climate variability and change in local decision making.

The event is sponsored by the UB Strategic Strength in Civic Engagement and Public Policy (CEPP), which funded Grover's recent work in the field through a 2011 CEPP research fellowship.