NIST Forming New Community Resilience Panel
Its formation is part of the institute's effort to reduce the damage natural, technological, and human-caused hazards inflict on U.S. communities.
The National Institute of Standards and Technology, a Commerce Department agency, is looking for members for a new Community Resilience Panel. Its formation is part of the institute's effort to reduce the heavy damage caused by natural, technological, and human-caused hazards in U.S. communities. NIST will convene the first meeting of the panel Nov. 9 at its campus in Gaithersburg, Md.
The agency's announcement said the panel's key objectives include:
- connecting and engaging community and infrastructure-sector stakeholders at all levels to identify policy and standards-related gaps and barriers and to propose innovative solutions to improve community resilience
- developing and maintaining a central repository for guidance documents, tools and reference materials to support community resilience planning and implementation
The panel's membership is open to all interested participants. It will be organized into more than a dozen stakeholder categories to ensure balanced participation; they range from local governments to infrastructure systems, building construction, and insurance/reinsurance.
The panel's members will inform future versions of the Community Resilience Planning Guide for Buildings and Infrastructure Systems, which NIST plans to issue this month. It will provide a practical approach to help communities set priorities and to allocate resources for reducing risks by improving their resilience, based on their social and economic needs, their particular hazard risks, and their buildings and infrastructure systems.