Decision Integration for Strong Communities (DISC) and Tools to Support Tribal Climate Adaptation

Many communities have a goal to be more sustainable (i.e. maintaining and enhancing community economic and social vitality, along with environmental integrity). However, smaller (<~50,000 population) and especially rural and tribal communities, may lack the resources to accomplish their sustainability goals. EPA’s Office and Research and Development and EPA Region 10 have developed a downloadable computer application named DISC (Decisions Integration for Strong Communities) which provides, a) a basic sustainability index with social, economic and environmental dimensions that can be generated with minimal effort from a community, b) a mechanism to create scenarios to examine changes in sustainability characteristics based on proposed community decisions, and c) links to resources to help understand and enhance the sustainability of their community. Community engagement in an agile environment has been vital to the development of DISC. The DISC application, including sustainability indicators, scenario building, and especially output which provides links to government, nonprofit and other resources are provided in this presentation. In this session we invite Native American tribal evaluation and input to help ensure that DISC addresses their priorities and goals.

Impact/Purpose

The EPA is fostering smart growth strategies to help communities grow in ways that expand economic opportunity while protecting human health and the environment. EPA’s Region 10 and EPA’s Office of Research and Development have developed a downloadable computer application named DISC (Decisions Integration for Strong Communities) which provides, a) a basic sustainability index with social, economic and environmental dimensions that can be generated with minimal effort from a community, b) a mechanism to create scenarios to examine changes in sustainability characteristics based on proposed community decisions, and c) links to resources to help understand and enhance the sustainability of their community. The DISC application, including sustainability indicators, scenario building, and especially output which provides links to government, nonprofit and other resources are provided in this presentation. Community engagement in an agile environment has been vital to the development of DISC. In this poster we invite Native American tribal evaluation and input to help ensure that DISC addresses their priorities and goals. This application will provide support for making balanced decisions to address the long-term needs for these communities, especially those which are rural, tribal or without resources that are available to larger cities.

Citation

Salazar, Maria, S. Frederick, J. Tolmie, AND V. Phan. Decision Integration for Strong Communities (DISC) and Tools to Support Tribal Climate Adaptation. Northwest Climate Conference, Portland, OR, October 08 - 10, 2019.