Kirsten Lackstrom

The role of ad hoc networks in supporting climate change adaptation: a case study from the Southeastern United States

To examine the factors that support adaptation within a regional and sectoral context, this article explores five climate-sensitive sectors in North and South Carolina (Forestry, Government Administration, Tourism, Water Management, and Wildlife Management) and the role of partnerships, collaborations, and networks in facilitating climate adaptation and related activities. Drawing from 117 online questionnaires and interviews with sector leaders across the Carolinas, the article highlights several key functions of networks in regard to supporting adaptation—intra-sector information sharing; monitoring, data collection, and research; and education and outreach. Furthermore, the analysis examines how climate networks in the region have facilitated the development of bonding, bridging, and linking social capital while also noting factors that have constrained the growth and success of both intra- and cross-sector collaboration. Although no formal, or discrete, state or regional cross-sector climate change network exists in the Carolinas, climate adaptations and capacity-building efforts have been supported by ad hoc and decentralized networks, emerging collegial partnerships within and across sectors, and collaborative efforts to pool expertise and resources. The role of different forms of social capital within these networks is discussed in the context of a contentious political environment where support for activities designed to address climate change is limited. These findings enhance our understanding of the social factors and relational processes that shape and influence capacity to adapt to climate change.

What Stakeholder Needs Tell Us about Enabling Adaptive Capacity: The Intersection of Context and Information Provision across Regions in the United States

In recent years increasing attention has been focused on understanding the different resources that can support decision makers at all levels in responding to climate variability and change. This article focuses on the role that access to information and other potential constraints may play in the context of water decision making across three U.S. regions (the Intermountain West, the Great Lakes, and the Carolinas). The authors report on the degree to which climate-related needs or constraints pertinent to water resources are regionally specific. They also find that stakeholder-identified constraints or needs extended beyond the need for data/information to enabling factors such as governance arrangements and how to improve collaboration and communication. As climate information networks expand and emphasis is placed on encouraging adaptation more broadly, these constraints have implications not only for how information dissemination efforts are organized but for how those efforts need to be informed by the larger regional context in a resource-limited and fragmented landscape.

Climate-Sensitive Decisions and Time Frames: A Cross-Sectoral Analysis of Information Pathways in the Carolinas

AbstractThis paper analyzes the information dissemination pathways that support climate-sensitive decisions in North and South Carolina. The study draws from over 100 online questionnaires and follow-up interviews with leaders in the forestry, natural resources management, planning and preparedness, tourism and recreation, and water supply management sectors. Participants represented subregions within each state, different types of organizations, and organizations working at different geographic scales. The cross-sector comparison demonstrates diverse information uses across multiple time horizons and a wide range of sector-specific needs and factors that influence how and where decision makers obtain climate information. It builds upon previous research regarding climate decision making by providing a comprehensive view of the patterns of information exchange within a given region. Although all sectors draw from a common pool of federal agencies for historical and current climate data, participants consi...

Negotiating a Mainstreaming Spectrum: Climate Change Response and Communication in the Carolinas

Abstract North and South Carolina have experienced considerable land-use change, urban sprawl and environmental management challenges within the past 30 years that have amplified and interacted with growing impacts from climate variability and change. However, with strong conservative majorities in the legislatures of both states, political tension around the issue of climate change has intensified, increasing the need for sensitive and deliberate climate change response strategies that mainstream action into salient areas of public concern. With data from online questionnaires and interviews with over 100 leaders within the Carolinas, this research explores a number of context-specific socio-ecological factors that influence climate change response activities and the mainstreaming process. Additionally, this study highlights how a key component of mainstreaming climate response action in the Carolinas involves the careful use of public communication frames. As such, mainstreamed climate change response within this region of the USA is often aligned publicly with other relevant areas of concern, not referenced or communicated as climate change response. Focusing on the process of mainstreaming provides a salient opportunity to bridge literatures around the concepts of mainstreaming and communication framing while analysing pathways by which climate change response activities are initiated, developed and enacted.

Using a Local Greenway to Study the River Environment and Urban Landscape.

Abstract Greenways are prominent features of many urban landscapes and synthesize several geographic topics: human–environment interactions, urban ecosystems, and the promotion of sustainability within riverine corridors. Greenways are easily accessible and provide an opportunity for students at various grade levels to study interactions across physical and human systems. Students can gain an appreciation of the natural and cultural resources located in a local river environment while building skills linked to the National Geography Standards. Greenway-related activities can be designed so that students practice the acquisition, interpretation, and integration of geographic information obtained from a variety of sources and methods.

CoCoRaHS Observers Contribute to “Condition Monitoring” in the Carolinas: A New Initiative Addresses Needs for Drought Impacts Information

AbstractThis article introduces two new tools developed to enhance drought impacts monitoring by citizen scientists. In collaboration with the National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS), the National Drought Mitigation Center (NDMC), and the Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow (CoCoRaHS) network, the Carolinas Integrated Sciences and Assessments (CISA) developed an experimental method of drought monitoring and reporting by citizen scientists. Since 2013, CISA has recruited CoCoRaHS observers in the Carolinas to participate in “condition monitoring,” the regular reporting of local conditions. In contrast to intermittent drought impact reports, condition monitoring creates a baseline for comparison of change through time and improves understanding of the onset, intensification, and recovery of drought.A project evaluation demonstrated the usefulness of the qualitative reports, while also identifying a need for improved accessibility to the information and a quantitative metric to more qu...