Preparing for Extreme Weather Events: Presentation of the City’s Natural Hazard Mitigation Plan

At 6:30 p.m. on Monday, March 11th, the City of Melrose Public Works Department will hold a public meeting to discuss our readiness to handle climate-related events and emergencies and how we can become more prepared. The meeting will be held in the Melrose High School Learning Commons.

During the past year, the City of Melrose has been holding internal, regional, and community discussions regarding its current assets, impacts on them from natural hazards, which potential hazards to address and how to make Melrose more resilient as we expect more extreme weather in the future. A portion of this work was funded through the State’s Municipal Vulnerability Preparedness (MVP) grant program. We have now completed the final draft of the City’s Natural Hazard Mitigation Plan, which will be submitted to the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency for approval later this month. This plan is our blueprint for reducing the risk to the community from environmental hazards and improving our ability to recover from the stronger storms that we expect as the impacts of climate change continue to increase. The plan outlines a list of recommended actions for the community to implement to improve our preparedness. Melrose first conducted a similar study in 2004. That study identified several infrastructure projects, many of which have been since constructed and are providing tremendous benefit to the community. We look forward to completing this updated study and the possibility of additional enhancements as funding is realized in the future.

Please join us on March 11th at 6:30 PM to hear the conclusions of Melrose’s efforts in preparing this document. The draft Natural Hazard Mitigation Plan can be viewed here: Draft Natural Hazard Mitigation Plan