Abstract

By explicitly considering climate change in local planning and decision-making, Bainbridge Island will be on a path to a resilient future. These actions must start today as the decisions currently being made will set the stage for our ability to respond in the future. The broader vision and hope for this Climate Impact Assessment is that the guidance contained herein will enable the City of Bainbridge Island (COBI) to effectively adapt to the implications of a changing climate in the coming decades.

Communities need to know how to begin planning for climate change. One guiding premise of this Assessment is that: Communities can make good decisions when they have information and know what questions to ask.

The Bainbridge Island Climate Impact Assessment (BICIA) is a resource to guide the community to the relevant and applied information to help us ask the questions that will lead us to climate-informed decisions. Users of the BICIA should be able to find pertinent climate information, formulate questions to help them evaluate the implications of climate change for their own work or interests, and make climate-savvy decisions that will generate the best long-term outcomes for our community — its businesses, schools, services, recreation, ecosystems and individuals.