Oct 28, 2016 - Climathon: a civic-hack focused on developing innovative solutions to the climate crisis. Dubbed 'INvisio
RECAP: CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS CLIMATHON Event Overview For 24 hours on October 28th, 2016, Indianapolis joined over 50 cities around the world to participate in Climathon: a civic-hack focused on developing innovative solutions to the climate crisis. Dubbed 'INvision Resiliency,' the Indianapolis Climathon focused on creating resources to enable local neighborhoods to strengthen their climate resilience. Teams were tasked with developing proposals that included: neighborhood-scale solutions, ideas that both mitigate impacts from disasters and improve residents' everyday quality of life, and ways to repurpose resources that are readily available in Indy neighborhoods. The event kicked off at 10 am on October 28th with rousing remarks from IUPUI Vice Chancellor Camy Broeker and Deputy Mayor of Community Development Jeff Bennett. Both speakers thanked participants for dedicating their time to improve the city, and discussed the importance of climate action and resiliency planning in Indianapolis. Following the welcome session, participants dove into solution-building. The nearly 50 attendees paired themselves into six groups and began brainstorming ideas for their proposals. The teams had an opportunity to meet with subject-matter experts through the afternoon and evening to gain feedback on their initial ideas, and some participated in 'baseball swapping' to learn from each other's team members. The groupwork sessions were broken up throughout the 24 hours by meals and 'energizer' activities. While most meals were catered, participants and coaches got the chance to venture back to their college years with dinner at IUPUI's Tower Dining Hall! The energizer activities were taught by students of IUPUI's School of Physical Education and Tourism Management and included a tour of IUPUI's campus, fitness and nutrition trivia, yoga, and 'zumba'-like exercise dance. After nearly 24 hours of ideation and solution building, teams presented their proposals to a panel of judges. The judges spanned a wide range of expertise, from resiliency to community development to the management of Indianapolis. The winning team, “The Connectors,” made up of staff of the Marion County Public Health Department, was awarded a $5,000 grant to hire two fellows. These fellows will be working in the two new Great Places 2020 Neighborhoods to integrate sustainability and climate resilience into the new Great Places plans. Additionally, the Marion County Public Health Department will be working with several of the other teams to develop community organizing frameworks for their fellows. Teams with applicationbased proposals will be working directly with the City of Indianapolis to integrate their ideas with RequestIndy, the official City of Indianapolis app.
Team Proposal Summaries The Connectors Public health is concerned with climate change issues such as: extreme weather, droughts and floods, increased ozone and pollen formation, mental health issues, civil unrest and asthma. A major barrier in neighborhood resilience is connectivity to neighbors and to existing resources. The proposed project focuses on neighborhood connectivity solutions that include: Training - Provide training for select Health Department staff in community organizing. Then the selected Health Department trained staff will provide community organizing training to neighborhood residents. Communication - Assess climate change resources available to neighborhood residents, develop a mobile app that tracks community needs and provides real time information about climate change resources for adaptation and mitigation strategies, and use existing social media—Pinterest, Snap Chat, Instagram, NextDoor, etc. Advocacy - Identify neighborhood champions and advocates for climate change adaptation and mitigation, and connect neighborhood champions and advocates with resource advocates in the community to support the neighborhood’s adaptation and mitigation efforts.
INgage INgage is a dynamic platform for community-based resilient design response. Through a "Green Blocks" program, community leaders would be equipped with a comprehensive design “toolkit” that addresses community resilience. One of the aspects of the “toolkit” involved skills training and certification for community leaders. The INgage platform is an open-sourced, web-based mobile platform that community members and leaders can install on their computers or smartphones. The INgage app will help track a wide range of user inputs and automated inputs from "Block Leaders." Accruing a certain level of accomplishment at either a personal or communitywide level will result in recognition through a resilient communities rating system. Achievements through the rating systems will come with incentives to motivate continued engagement among a household and/or community.
Green2Green Green2Green is based on the belief that there is a way to promote economic resiliency and get money back into the pockets of everyday people while promoting sustainable practices. Green2Green is a mobile app which allows users to assess their daily habits to see money saving opportunities by implementing sustainable practices. The app aggregates the user’s expected saving as they answer each question in the app for a total expected savings. Green2Green explores 5 savings categories and community resources: Water, Energy, Transportation, Shopping, and Food.
Apoca-Rangers: Climate Defense Corps Apoca-Rangers is a Climate Defense Corps made up of teams of neighbors. Dubbed “Rangers” for the purposes of the proposal, but neighbors would be encouraged to come up with a name that resonates with their community. Rangers are neighborhood leaders who serve as experts in resilience along a spectrum of key stress points, such as: food, water, and energy. Implementation values include bottom-
up organizing; city-supported, neighborhood-focused; intergenerational and interactive; and transformative rather than transactional.
West 40 West 40 proposed an ‘Emergency Preparedness’ toolkit that could be used by residents, families, communities and cities. The first step is to have a family ‘Emergency Preparedness’ plan and kit in place and to have practiced the plan. The next step is to know how to take action in the community. Whether this is helping the senior in the house next to you or knowing where the neighborhood meeting place is to organize relief efforts. The ‘Emergency Preparedness’ toolkit provides residents with the essential guidance to get themselves, their family and their community organized and prepared for a natural disaster. The toolkit provides a checklist for a "disaster kit" for the home that includes items such as flashlights and battery-powered radios. The toolkit also provides guidance for how to develop a neighborhood and community emergency evacuation plan.
INpower Planters IN Power Planters address inefficient buildings, food deserts, and neighborhood resiliency through guided innovative greenhouse designs. The systems take advantage of the excess heat and cooling wasted through a building's HVAC system by adding a simple greenhouse onto the building. This uses and improves existing building stock, provides a secondary building shell and HVAC checkup, and mitigates the urban heat island effect. Co-benefits include providing food and nutrients, improved air quality, and captured waste heat.
Thank You to Our Sponsors INvision Resiliency would not have been possible without the help of community partners. Thank you to the IUPUI Office of Sustainability for presenting the event, and the McKinney Family Foundation for funding the grant award for the winning team. Additionally, thank you to the event sponsors: Neighborhood Champions Trendy Minds and Coca Cola; Neighborhood Advocates, Eskenazi Health and KERAMIDA; and Neighborhood Sustainer, American Structure Point. Additionally, we would like to thank Climate-KIC, who sparked the Climathon movement and supported over 50 Climathon events in cities around the world.
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