Montague Town Hall. Staff File Photo/Paul Franz
Staff Report
MONTAGUE — As part of what it calls the MVP 2.0 process, the town is working to engage residents about climate change vulnerability and resilience this summer.
This update to the town’s 2018 Municipal Vulnerability Preparedness (MVP) planning process focuses on gathering feedback from residents who are most impacted by the effects of climate change. The feedback will help the town identify social vulnerabilities and strengthen its efforts to build climate resilience.
According to an announcement from the Franklin Regional Council of Governments and Town Planner Maureen Pollock, the early part of the MVP 2.0 process has already identified stories that illustrate the connection between social vulnerability and climate vulnerability to hazards such as flooding, erosion, rising annual temperatures, heat waves and damaging storms. For example, some families in Montague are forced by a lack of affordable housing to double up in the same housing units as other families. The team has also heard that during the heavy rains and flooding of 2023, some families living in basements were flooded out.
The 12-person project team — which includes residents; liaisons from community organizations such as The Brick House Community Resource Center and Montague Catholic Social Ministries; municipal employees; and FRCOG staff — wants to hear from residents about factors that make them feel socially vulnerable. Examples include language, food insecurity, housing insecurity and access to transportation. The project team is reaching out to residents through surveys, interviews and focus groups.
In particular, residents with life circumstances that may increase overall vulnerability — such as older residents and youth, renters, unhoused residents, low-income residents, households that speak a language other than English at home, residents of color, residents with experience of substance abuse issues, LGBTQ residents, residents with a disability, caretakers and neurodivergent residents — are encouraged to take the survey.
The survey can be taken online in English at tinyurl.com/yvj46bha or in Spanish at tinyurl.com/5n8d7n5w. Printed surveys are available at Montague Town Hall, Carnegie Public Library, Millers Falls Library, Montague Center Library and the Gill-Montague Senior Center.
Later this summer, the project team will work with residents to develop a revised set of climate resilience priorities and ideas for small projects to address them. Residents who are interested in participating in a focus group later this summer or otherwise being contacted for their input should indicate their interest at the end of the survey.
With questions, contact Pollock at mpollock@montague-ma.gov or 413-863-3200, ext. 112.
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