A few months ago, local partners in Hurricane Matthew recovery sat at a six-top table at a diner in Kinston, N.C. We had spent the morning walking through the logistics for hosting an AmeriCorps team that would soon be in town, meeting just a few weeks following the one-year anniversary of Hurricane Matthew.
Sierra C. Woodruff is a PhD candidate at University North Carolina at Chapel Hill in the Curriculum for the Environment and Ecology. Her research focuses on how planning can help communities preserve ecosystem services and reduce the impacts of climate change.
Students in Coastal Resilience Center of Excellence (CRC) Director Gavin Smith’s “Planning for Natural Hazards and Climate Change Adaptation” class learned about local government response to environmental issues during a field trip that included visits to the Land Use and Environmental Services Agency and to properties impacted by flooding around the city of Charlotte in Mecklenburg County, N.C.