Equity in Climate Planning

Climate action planning provides an opportunity for local governments to consider historic and existing inequities and to invest resources into mitigating climate change, adapting to climate impacts, and improving equitable outcomes for people.

ICLEI analyzed 16 climate action plans from around the country that include equity considerations. The resulting report assesses the trends and practices for integrating equity into climate plans.

Report:  Equity in Climate Planning: Trends and Best Practices for Local Governments 

This Storymap compliments a detailed report and a series of fact sheets covering the five major topic areas related to equity in climate planning for local governments. For more research summary, trend analysis, and additional resources, please see the full report.

 ICLEI-Local Governments for Sustainability (ICLEI)  is the first and largest global network of more than 2,500 local and regional governments devoted to solving the world's most intractable sustainability challenges. The worldwide network is active in 125+ countries, focused on influencing sustainability policies and driving local action across five key pathways: low emissions, resilient, equitable, people-centered, nature-based, and circular development.

As the USA Office of a global ICLEI network, ICLEI USA develops and delivers leading-edge tools and resources, including its state-of-the-art emissions-management tool, ClearPath Climate Planner, to support local government's climate change efforts. Our standards, tools, and programs credibly, transparently, and robustly reduce greenhouse gas emissions, improve lives and livelihoods, and protect natural resources in the U.S. communities we serve. ICLEI USA and our network partners are working to keep 1.5°C alive through a data-driven approach focusing on just and equitable communities.

This Storymap and report build on the  ICLEI USA Equity First Steps Guide  which offers a starting place for local governments considering equity in the climate planning process.

Resilience: ICLEI USA’s  Adaptation in Climate Planning: Recommendations for U.S. Local Governments  provides a step-by-step process for resilience planning that includes equity considerations at every step.

Equity can be defined differently based on the context in which the concept is considered. Within this specific context of climate planning, one definition of equity is: 

Committing to equity in climate planning includes acknowledging the deficits of the past and proactively addressing past wrongs for historically marginalized people, while facilitating opportunities in the present and future.

An equity-centered approach focuses on the challenges faced by frontline communities and creates strategies that address those challenges while reducing greenhouse gas emissions and adapting to the effects of climate change.  

Before taking action, it is crucial to recognize and aim to understand the history and continued role of local governments in denying equity. In the U.S., federal, state, and local governments have long been culpable in denying the rights, needs, and experiences of certain groups. For example, zoning decisions around the country resulted in locating industrial sites near communities of color, causing disproportionate health impacts from air and water pollution. 

As inequality and climate-related threats increase, they will disproportionately impact the most vulnerable in our communities. As the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) explains, “Even though climate change affects everyone, its impacts are not experienced equally across populations. [In the U.S.,] Black, Indigenous, people of color (BIPOC), low-income, elderly, and other historically marginalized communities are more vulnerable to flooding, extreme heat, sea-level rise, and other hazards of a changing climate.”

Climate action planning provides an opportunity for local governments to consider historical and existing inequities and to invest resources into mitigating climate change, adapting to climate impacts, and improving equitable outcomes for people. If climate action plans do not specifically incorporate equity considerations, they can further exacerbate inequities.

ICLEI USA's report explores five topic areas for integrating equity into climate planning.

What role does equity play in local government climate plans?

ICLEI analyzed 16 climate action plans from around the country that include equity considerations. The resulting report assesses the trends and practices for integrating equity into climate plans.

The broad themes from ICLEI’s report offer an overview of how 16 local governments chose to embed equity within their climate planning, and how much equity concerns informed outcomes of the plan. These plans offer a few models for how equity can be incorporated into a planning process.

• Consider equity in every planning and programmatic phase. Plans that strive to create beneficial equity outcomes generally include thorough community outreach; examination of locally-specific equity data; priorities and actions that address local equity challenges raised by the community; metrics that track equity-related impacts; and partnerships or funding efforts that lean on existing local institutions. 

• There are many ways to incorporate equity. There are many models for making equity central to a planning process. Equity can be included throughout a plan as a “lens” or “pillar”, or included as a consideration in each subsection.

• Land acknowledgements can be a starting point. Local governments should make an effort to engage local Indigenous communities in planning, whether that is through a land acknowledgement process or otherwise in community engagement efforts. 

• Resilience and equity are closely linked. Frontline communities are often the most vulnerable to climate-related risks. For this reason, resilience and equity planning should go hand-in-hand to ensure equitable outcomes for the most at-risk communities. 

• Local data is key. Strong equity plans incorporate local information about inequities and include actions that specifically address local challenges.

Was feedback from the community, particularly from frontline or historically disadvantaged communities, meaningfully incorporated into the planning process?

Engaging the community thoughtfully, elevating historically marginalized voices, building trust, and moving toward community ownership are key means of understanding the challenges faced by your community and are important for shaping climate equity plans. ICLEI analyzed 16 climate action plans from around the country that include equity considerations. The climate plans in ICLEI’s review that had the most thorough community engagement also had the most equity-oriented goals and outcomes.

Findings

Community is at the heart of strong plans that advance equity outcomes while mitigating climate change. Involving community members in the planning process helps ensure that more perspectives are taken into account and that the goals identified in the plan rectify past injustices and do not cause further harm to those who have been harmed by past government policies. Conducting community engagement should be done thoughtfully, with respect towards local preferences, community needs, repairing or acknowledging past harms, and long-term relationship building. In ICLEI’s report, you can find a list of frequently-used community engagement techniques from the analyzed plans.

Shifting Internal Mindsets: Efforts that aim to highlight and challenge the biases held by staff, elected officials, and volunteers, along with local context for how inequities are or have been part of local government policy and programs, can lead to more effective engagement with communities. People who understand how local government structures and policies may perpetuate colonial attitudes and subjugation of marginalized populations may be more prepared to develop relationships with community members.

• Try multiple methods for engagement. A key means to involve community members is broadening the array of methods used for engagement. Some plans we analyzed discuss five or more community engagement methods, while others offer creative methods specific to their local context. 

• Build ongoing relationships. Community engagement is an ongoing process. Once people give their time and energy toward creating a plan, there is the potential to build a relationship with them, including following up later on with progress updates. Seek to create a climate plan that directly responds to community members' challenges, inequities, or ideas.

• Design community engagement strategies with equity and inclusion in mind. Strive to meet community members where they are, support their involvement through compensation or other means, and employ strategies to make engagement welcoming and accessible for all.

Do the plan’s actions connect directly to equity-focused outcomes?

The core of climate action plans are the actions (alternatively called strategies, pathways, initiatives, programs, solutions, big moves, or big ideas) that a local government plans to implement to reach their goals. ICLEI’s analysis reviews general categories of climate actions that incorporate equity, provides examples for how equity can show up in each of those categories, and discusses evaluation tools that local governments used to determine whether potential strategies will or will not advance equity.

The following ten action areas were common among plans. There are many ways that local governments designed their actions within these categories to address equity.

• Energy
• Buildings, Housing and Energy Efficiency
• Local Government Operations
• Materials and Waste
• Transportation (including transit and electric vehicles)
• Natural Systems
• Water
• Food/Community Health
• Community Resilience/Emergency Preparedness
• Workforce Development

Plans used various methods to ensure equity was incorporated into each action or category of actions. These methods helped elevate equity to be a key focus of the plan’s actions, beyond simply stating a commitment to equity. 

• Incorporate community feedback and local data into actions. It is crucial to take community engagement feedback and use local data to identify the biggest equity needs in your community, and to consider meeting those needs a central goal of the plan’s actions. 

• Strategic methods can ensure equity is part of every action. To truly embed equity into a climate action plan, it must be incorporated into the actions that the plan recommends. This can be done through several methods:
  • Putting all proposed actions through an equity filter or tool can ensure that all actions include equity outcomes and do not cause further harm. These tools should be built from community engagement.
  • A visual indicator can demonstrate how equity is part of each action. These indicators can compare equity impacts by predetermined criteria to show the scale or field of impact.
  • A designated section within each action area of the plan can be a place to discuss current inequities and potential equity impacts of action.

Does the plan include local data about inequities and metrics for evaluating equity outcomes?

Data can help understand the landscape of inequity in your community. It can provide a starting point for understanding trends and dynamics for different neighborhoods or populations in your area. It’s important to keep in mind that data can be faulty and does not tell the whole story. Incorporating both qualitative and quantitative data can expand the scope of what is covered. Data analysis is most effective when accompanied by community outreach to understand lived experiences and to address subjects or areas that may be overlooked in large data sets.

ICLEI USA’s  Equity: First Steps Guide  introduces local governments to equity by providing tools to identify and track inequities that occur within their community within five categories:

• Energy Access

• Public Health

• Infrastructure

• Economic Prosperity

• Education

At a minimum, these are the areas in which communities should analyze inequities. Data collected can be used as an entry point for engaging community members.

Metrics are a crucial part of climate plans, used to measure and demonstrate impact toward desired outcomes. Stating equity values is an empty exercise if the measures of success do not reflect specific equity-related outcomes. It’s important to not only discuss what actions were completed and how successful their implementation was, but whether actions made a difference in the community. A thorough plan goes beyond measuring the activities of the local government and aims to measure the actual outcomes and impacts.

• Establish a baseline. Choose metrics or indicators that represent equity, collect data at the beginning of the process for a baseline, and track change over time to measure progress.

• Data must be accompanied by community input to understand people’s lived experiences. Data from a variety of sources can provide an overview of where you’re starting: what inequities exist, how populations and resources are geographically distributed, and what historical trends influence this. However, raw data on its own does not tell the whole story. Data analysis must be accompanied by community input and stories to understand people’s lived experiences. 

• Prioritize local data. While national trends can be relevant for local communities, it is important to consider the stories in your community at the most granular level possible. National or global trends can be a starting point for identifying inequities, but local information is needed to make sure these are priorities in your community. 

• What gets measured gets done. The metrics we choose to hold ourselves accountable are what we pay attention to. Identifying equity-related metrics and keeping track of them moves a plan from commitments to action. While it can be difficult to accurately measure and track success related to equity goals, measuring progress is key for long-term and large-scale change.

Does the plan mention any core partners or creative funding strategies that were integral to the creation of the plan?

Funding: There are many potential funding mechanisms local governments can explore for program and policy implementation work over time. Most plans in our analysis were funded fully from the local government’s budget or did not include information on how the planning process was funded. Two plans mentioned grants from private foundations, while two referred to federal funds that supported the planning process. The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) of 2022 and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) of 2021 are principal federal funding opportunities for climate investment that could apply to many local governments. Both of these bills prioritize funding for projects that advance environmental justice and equity.  Equity in Climate Planning  lays out the main ways local governments can benefit from these federal funding opportunities and includes detailed resources on pursuing that funding.

Partnerships: By working in partnership with others, local governments can increase the scope of what’s possible within a climate plan and bring others along to collaboratively implement the plan. While most plans mentioned organizations that contributed to community outreach, funding, facilitation, or other aspects necessary to the development of the plan, three plans discussed a critical partner that was instrumental in leading the planning process. For several plans, working together across jurisdictional boundaries broadened the plan’s impact and fostered regional collaboration. Partnerships can ensure that new efforts are additive and not duplicative, and that climate action plans take into account lessons learned from previous local projects. This type of collaboration works best when entities share openly and transparently about challenges, lessons learned, and barriers in doing the work.

• Seek Federal Funding. While most local governments create climate action plans through their own city or county budget, there are options for seeking both private or public funding to support the planning process. Currently, big investments from the federal government (IRA & IIJA) can be leveraged at the local level, particularly for equity-related outcomes. 

• Leverage existing community resources. Sustainability and climate planning is most effective when it leverages the resources that already exist in a community to strengthen the process. Bolster what already makes your community great, whether it’s academic institutions, existing government programs, nonprofit organizations, or other innovative partnerships. 

• Work together across jurisdictional boundaries. Where possible, look for opportunities to collaborate and share resources with neighboring city governments, county governments, or other regional governmental partnerships. This may help both reduce upfront planning costs to your community and share the benefits of planning actions over a broader population and geographic area

Read the full report  Equity in Climate Planning: Trends and Best Practices for Local Governments  for further details