As we consider Maine’s response to the recent painful demonstrations of the danger posed by climate change, flood and inundation to our coastal industries and communities, there are five confluent conditions in play.

1) The Maine Climate Council has put forward an ambitious agenda of recommendations and actions to address the urgent challenge of climate change through adaptation, mitigations and action.

2) Recent catastrophic climate events have devastated Maine, with dramatic evidence of how the consequences of extreme weather are no longer hypothetical, no longer unpredictable, but inevitable, forcing us to confront the pace and degree of our response to them.

3) Government response will typically be politically reactive, performative and under-funded without federal disaster relief. Expectations will be to reconstruct immediately, perhaps reconstructing no better than as was, which is clearly insufficient for the future.

4) The table of organization of state government reveals a concretized, conventionally organized structure with narrow silos of interest and administration. The legislative structure mimics that system through committees, appropriations and timelines, none with the capacity to innovate a cross-sectoral response to a statewide emergency.

5) As demonstrated by the early success of the Climate Council, innovation can only be effectively pursued through an exceptional model that integrates expertise and capacity, maximizes the efficiency of appropriations, recommends innovative structures and involves non-governmental expertise and public engagement.

Therefore, to maximize the statewide response to proof of current and future climate consequences, the mandate of the Climate Council should be re-stated and expanded. This process requires the immediate adaptation of its objectives and recommendations and a reassessment of the state’s goals and objectives. We must ensure that the efficiency, economy and expenditure of present budgets, future grants and exceptional appropriations are applied immediately to prescient design and implementation. This work must be based on no less than a projected 10-year response.

For example, a map of the recent extreme disruption of roadways, bridges and culverts, blocking transportation and emergency services, can provide the Departments of Transportation and Public Safety with a powerful planning document to supersede previous schedules and guide construction based on now evident, increased engineering requirements in response to recent destruction. Real-time events have given us more information of need and location than we have ever had before; we should take advantage.

Further, as we look to the reconstruction of coastal facilities, representatives of multiple state agencies – to include, at the minimum, Environmental Protection, Marine Resources, Conservation, Inland Fisheries and Waterways, Health and Human Services – must be collaboratively involved, so that overlapping interests and next steps are conjoined beyond the narrow limits of past jurisdictions. One would think that the State Planning Office would be the appropriate over-arching agency but, given the success of the Climate Council, perhaps it should be the appropriate management coordinator.

Gov. Janet Mills has declared a civil emergency; Federal Emergency Management Agency officials and funds will surely follow. But the efficient use of those funds, beyond simple repair, is essential.

Anything other than urgent implementation of the best long-term solutions – based on the assurance of further extreme events, certainly even more destructive – would be a tragic failure of leadership.

We have now experienced climate change up close, first hand; there can be no further denial. We have witnessed the flood with awe and dismay; we have before us nonetheless an extraordinary opportunity that must be aggressively pursued through foresight, ingenuity and prescient leadership.

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