Community Resilience Index Participants - Communities In

OMB Control No. 0648-0342

Expiration Date: 4/30/2015

Interviews with Communities that Participated in the Coastal Storms Program Community Resiliency Index

NOAA’s Coastal Service Center in Charleston, SC is currently working with Eastern Research Group, Inc. (ERG) to conduct an evaluation of the NOAA Coastal Storms Program (CSP) in the Gulf of Mexico. The purpose of the evaluation is to assess the program’s progress toward its objectives and the economic impact of the program in terms of costs and benefits. As part of this evaluation, ERG is conducting interviews with communities that took part in the Community Resiliency Index planning sessions to understand how the CRI benefited those communities and improved resiliency among those communities.

1. Did the Community Resiliency Index (CRI) session help you understand the potential risks that your community faces from a coastal storm?

2. Did the CRI session help you understand the steps you need to take to improve your community’s resiliency?

3. To what extent did your community “drive” the session? That is, did the session reflect your needs as a community?

4. To what extent did the CRI session help you build a partnership with NOAA, Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant, and/or with your local facilitator(s)?

5. Following the session, what were the major actions that you took to improve your community’s resiliency?

6. Was your community a Community Rating Scale (CRS) participant before the CRI session? Did the session help you understand how to improve your CRS score? [Or, did the CRI session urge you to join the CRS program?]

7. Do you expect the actions you took after the CRI session to lead to an improved CRS score?

8. Did the CRI session and the actions you took afterwards improve the resiliency of your community? Why or why not?

9. Would you say that the CRI session has made you better prepared for major coastal storms? Why or why not?

10. Were you more prepared for Hurricane Isaac compared to Hurricane Katrina as a result of things you learned from the CRI session? Why or why not?

Thank you for your participation!

Public reporting burden for this collection of information is estimated to average 60 minutes per response, including the time for reviewing instructions, searching existing data sources, gathering and maintaining the data needed, and completing and reviewing the collection of information. Send comments regarding this burden estimate or any other suggestions for reducing this burden to Audra Luscher, NOAA Coastal Services Center, 2234 South Hobson Avenue, Charleston, SC 29405 (audra.luscher@noaa.gov, 310-713-0525 ext. 185).

Notwithstanding any other provisions of the law, no person is required to respond to, nor shall any person be subjected to a penalty for failure to comply with, a collection of information subject to the requirements of the Paperwork Reduction Act, unless that collection of information displays a currently valid OMB Control Number.