Resilient Pasco vulnerability assessment and action plan

1:02:21Mr. Chairman, if we are able to move to item number 17 on the agenda, it is a presentation of Resilient Pasco project, the Resiliency and Sustainability Action Plan.

1:02:33All right.

1:02:42Good afternoon, Mr. Chair, Commission Members, Amanda Hill, Planning Development and Economic Growth staff. I'll be presenting today on PC 17, file number PDE 25-0110, along with Sean Lahav, who represents the consulting firm that was hired to provide services for this project.

1:03:02Thank you.

1:03:05The county received a planning grant in the amount of $754,870. These were community development block grant mitigation funds, and the grant is administered by the Florida Department of Commerce. There are three main parts of this project. the development of a Living Shorelines Plan, the completion of a vulnerability assessment, and the development of a resilience and sustainability action plan. Like I mentioned, Half Associates was hired as the prime consultant on this project, and there

1:03:35was also additional technical assistance provided by Fernleaf and Taylor Engineering.

1:03:43Project activities began in September of twenty twenty three. In March of 2024, the Living Shore Alliance Plan was completed. In June of 2024, the countywide vulnerability assessment was completed. And we are currently completing the Resilience and Sustainability Action Plan that's anticipated to be completed by April of 2025.

1:04:05I am now going to pass it over to Sean so that he can provide us with some insights into the vulnerability assessment and the resilience and sustainability action plan.

1:04:13All right, thank you.

1:04:14Hey, good afternoon commissioners. Really appreciate the opportunity to present to you today. My name is Sean Lahave. I'm HAFS National Resilience Market Leader. I've served as the consultant project manager on this project since 2023, and we're almost wrapping up. To get started today, I want to highlight some findings and insights from the risk and vulnerability assessment. This was a very extensive process, so this is a summary level overview of what was found. As part of the vulnerability assessment, we looked at current and future tidal flooding, storm surge, sea level

1:04:45rise, extreme rainfall, and compound flooding. Regarding the tidal flooding and storm surge flooding findings, which is very prevalent given the amount of hurricanes that have passed through this area of Florida over the past two years. It was very interesting to note that less than 5% of Pasco County overall was exposed to these conditions. But then when we broke it down into the West Market area, I'll show you a map in a few seconds. Between 16 to 55 percent of the West Market area was exposed to tidal flooding and storm

1:05:15surge conditions across different scenarios, and I'll highlight that in a second. So one of the important questions, why did we conduct this vulnerability assessment to begin with? In 2021, the state legislature established the Resilient Florida program and passed Section 380.093 Florida statutes. The statutory requirements requires that every municipality and county in the state of Florida conduct a flood vulnerability assessment to remain eligible for infrastructure funding from the state. So we went ahead and engaged in

1:05:45that process, but Pasco County wanted to make it a much more detailed vulnerability assessment beyond the minimum requirements. Looking at additional key insights, we evaluated the vulnerabilities of different critical infrastructure asset types. There's four asset classes within the statutes. transportation and evacuation routes, primarily looking at roadways like US nineteen as an economic corridor. Then looking at critical infrastructure assets, water, wastewater treatment plants, lift stations, pump stations. Critical

1:06:16community and emergency facilities looking at police stations, fire stations, the building we're standing in, and then natural, cultural, and historical assets. Looking at the storm surge scenarios across current conditions and then through the future into 2050 and to 2080. Up to 20% of critical infrastructure assets in the county were identified as being vulnerable solely through the mapping. So what plays out in reality or different storm events will be different, but the mapping and the vulnerability

1:06:47assessment identified up to 20% of those assets. Then looking at tidal flooding, commonly referred to as nuisance flooding or sunny day flooding, doesn't have to be associated with a storm. Up to 10 percent of transportation and evacuation routes within Pasco County were identified as being affected. We also looked at compound flooding, which is an emerging topic across the state of Florida. looking at the correlation between riverine flooding, storm surge, and rainfall within a three-day period. So if a storm comes in and the water levels are already

1:07:17high, what will be the impacts from that event? And then two final factors, looking at extreme rainfall, there are NASA projections and projections from the Florida Institute of Technology, or FIU down in South Florida. And there was projected to be an increase in rainfall across the county. This is hard or difficult to model, but we did our best to kind of identify what are those change factors. And then finally, this was not a required component of the statutory requirements, but as part of the Resilient

1:07:47Pasco project, we also looked at extreme heat vulnerability, looking at the urban heat island effect, primarily in the West Market area, and then in Zephyrhills and Dade City.

1:08:00So going back to what I was maintaining about the West Market area versus Pasco County. So not every area of Pasco County, particularly inland areas, are vulnerable to tidal flooding or storm surge. Rainfall is spread throughout the county. But looking at the 100 year or 1% annual chance storm surge conditions, the first map shows current conditions, so what would happen during a 100-year event under the present times. And then in accordance with the statutory requirements, we looked at the intermediate

1:08:30high, worst case scenario, sea level rise scenario. And in 2040 and 2070, if those projections prove true, you would see those tidal and storm surge conditions move further inland. There's a lot of detailed maps, a part of the vulnerability assessment that maps out all of your critical infrastructure assets.

1:08:51As Amanda previously mentioned, beyond the vulnerability assessment, there was a lot of other components of this project that tied into a Living Shorelines Plan and then a Resilience and Sustainability Action Plan. As part of the Resilience and Sustainability Action Plan once the vulnerability assessment was completed, we consulted a wide range of references to inform the methodology. The Florida Adaptation Guidebook was published by FDEP in NOAA in 2018. This has a wide range of resources.

1:09:22We also looked at national industry best practices. The federal government maintains the U.S. Climate Resilience Toolkit that assists communities with navigating these challenges. We also wanted to provide context of what other local governments across Florida and the country are doing, so we looked at Pinellas County and other municipalities and counties across the state through case studies. Community engagement was perhaps the most important part of this project back in June of last year over the summer. We facilitated four community engagement events all across

1:09:53Pasco County and then also engaged special interest groups in the business and emergency management communities. And then finally, looking at county priorities. Throughout this process, one of our chief objectives from the county and from the consultant side was to align this project with existing planning initiatives. That included the Pasco twenty fifty comprehensive plan update. The 2025 to 2030 strategic plan, and then the stormwater management master plan. So trying to align all of those efforts in harmony.

1:10:24In closing this presentation, have a few more slides or several more slides just talking about the structure of the Resilience and Sustainability Action Plan. This is essentially the implementation roadmap of all of the issues we identified. But beyond the issues related to flooding, storm surge, Pasco County also set forth a vision to look at sustainability, looking at water resource management, walkability, all of these different things. Yeah. The way the RSAP, the Resilience and Sustainability Action Plan, is organized, there's five

1:10:54themes structuring the document. Then within those themes there are respective goals or broader objectives. There's 32 goals. And then there are 93 action items in total to guide Pasco County over the next five, ten, even twenty or thirty years. As part of each action item, we looked at the timeframe. So, what is the time associated with implementing the action, the relative cost? Department champions across Pasco County. potential partners, looking at state agencies,

1:11:25universities, Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council, and then implementation pathways, who has to be responsible for this at the county perspective.

1:11:36Very briefly, just want to touch on each of the themes that were addressed in the RSAP. Theme one is focused on protecting neighborhoods. The question here is how do we minimize exposure to flooding where possible and reduce impacts to life, property, and infrastructure where unavoidable. And you can see all of the different action items that were included here.

1:11:59The second theme was adaptable and transparent government. This recognizes the need to be more communicative about current and future threats to Pasco County's way of life and what the county is currently doing and doing in the future to address that.

1:12:16Then responsible resource management. This is focused on water, energy, waste, and land resource management.

1:12:27The fourth theme is healthy and connected communities. This theme focuses on mobility opportunities, food, infield development, and extreme heat, or reducing extreme heat, to support walkable and connected communities. And then finally, targeted economic and cultural development, which is especially important uh in the aftermath of COVID and a lot of the things that the United States has experienced over the past few years. This focuses on economic resilience through workforce development in

1:12:57emerging industries. supporting local food production and distribution. Network distribution, and supporting arts and culture across the local community in Pasco County and across each of your municipalities. Before passing it off to Amandela for next steps, just want to say that it's been a pleasure to work with Pasco County on this project. This has been one of the most innovative resilience and sustainability projects that we've seen to date in the state of Florida. It really went the extra mile, and we're excited to see how this

1:13:27will impact future planning decisions and decisions at the Board of County Commissioners.

1:13:34Yes sir.

1:13:38The three different kinds of flooding areas. One of your first slides. Yeah. So He showed us a map of the storm surge areas. And the next slide. Did you map the tidal flooding and compound flooding areas as well? Yes. Um is that in your full report?

1:13:58Yes. So there's a very extensive full report. We're talking about dozens of pages and more than a hundred mapping products. The compound flooding model that was produced as part of this project shows compound flooding across the entire county, considering rainfall. And then the tidal and storm surge maps are very detailed. There's also a geo database which planning staff can reference. You can drill down all the way to the site scale and look at very uh fine detailed maps. Was the tidal flooding map provided? Uh that's a question that I would have

1:14:28to ask Amanda.

1:14:30Uh Amanda Hill, Plan Development, Economic Growth. So uh the planning files from this project have been distributed across the county. Um the project manager for the Stormwater Master Plan was actually one of the members of the Brazilian Pasco project team. So they have all the mapping that's associated with this project.

1:14:48Do you hear that, Patrick? Thank you.

1:14:53The solution to the ADU conversation? We've been struggling with creating a map, so that's why ask Ask the questions.

1:15:00Thank you. Thank you. Any other questions?

1:15:04Okay, great. Thank you very much. And Amanda has just uh final final comments.

1:15:11Thanks, Sean. Okay, so for next steps, we have begun collaborating with the Pasco 2050 Comprehensive Plan Team to integrate the policy recommendations within this document into the comprehensive plan. We are also planning to request adoption by resolution from the board. This would be on April 22nd. Apart from that, departments have begun executing the action items, whether it's through planning studies, data tracking, collaboration with

1:15:41potential partners, even construction projects in some cases, planning for those activities. And then to follow up on the question from Mr. Goldstein, in terms of implementation, this will be done by the Office of Strategy and Sustainability. So not only have the documents from the vulnerability assessment been transmitted to that department, we are also going to be transmitting the RSAP to them as well for further implementation. Any other questions or comments?

1:16:11No, great job.

1:16:13Thank you.

1:16:14Appreciate it. Yeah, thank you and have a wonderful day. Thank you very much.

1:16:19Comments?

1:16:21Well you Technically this is a presentation item, but if you want to take public comment that's up to the Planning Commission.

1:16:28Okay, I read it so

1:16:29I don't want to stifle anybody.

1:16:31Barbara Wilhite, eighty six twenty seven grand. I just wanna make sure you guys have read this, right? I had insomnia last night, I was preparing for all those items. So I read this. So I at first thought okay, I thought I knew what it would be. I get the heat, I get the tidal, I get the flooding, but I hope you know how far in reaching this study plan goes. There was talk about TOD and transit hubs. I didn't even know we had a such thing as a transit hub. Um vertically

1:17:02integrated mixed use, garbage pickup. Agricultural reserves, ecological planning units, rural and family lands protection for Northeast Pasco, solar panels on commercial buildings, EV charging stations, composting, infill development. And then I fell back asleep. So I just want what it sounds like it is, it's a lot more than that. It's very, very detailed. And I would hope That it gets the attention of if it's going to

1:17:32set policy direction, that somebody realizes it's a lot more than just. the things that you would think that resiliency is about. And I you did hear when they opened up they said that they went this county went way beyond what most counties do with these with this grant and this project. So just want to point that out 'cause I had read it. I thought it was interesting. So

1:17:53Barbara, I mean I guess my thought on that is that it's not really regulatory Unless it's integrated into the Complant or Land Development Code.

1:18:03Okay.

1:18:03So that's what the second bullet is. Right. I mean I which is raise begs the question of why are we adopting it by resolution. I don't know. I would

1:18:11think you would if I was back in my day it would be accepted and and you know received in the file.

1:18:19If it's not regulatory until it's included in the complaint, which is regulatory. Or line of Elmico, which is regulatory, what's the intent of adopting it by resolution.

1:18:31Um to answer that question, from my experience looking at other communities, it has been beneficial in terms of acquiring funding if you have an adopted resolution saying that this plan has been adopted by the board. So that would be the benefit of doing that adoption by resolution.

1:18:45So it's to assist with funding.

1:18:47C correct. For resilience planning efforts.

1:18:51Well the only thing I would ask is I don't know who's doing which department is doing this resolution. Which kind of department is doing the resolution?

1:18:59Department, Planning, Development, Economic Growth.

1:19:02Yeah, I mean you probably need to include a statement in the resolution just saying it's not regulatory. So we're not I mean I understand Barbara's concern. Her concern is If it's gonna be a regulatory document That's a different level of scrutiny that we would normally do to something than if it's not. So If it's only for purposes of funding That's fine, but we probably need a statement there saying it's not regulatory except to the extent it's integrated into the Complant or L D C.

1:19:31Not it. Thank you.

1:19:34Okay, thank you very much. So what we're recommending is that if we make a motion to approve it, it would be

1:19:41Well to be clear, you don't have to make a motion on this. Yeah. Presentation item. It was a presentation item, so you don't have to do anything with it. I'm just Well we have to do that.

1:19:53Somehow this is regular gonna be construed as regulatory which I don't think that's staff's intent from what I'm hearing. They just need to make that clear in the resolution.

1:20:06Noted.

1:20:08It does not require any action.

1:20:13Okay.