Washington, DC – U.S. Senators Jack Reed and Sheldon Whitehouse and Congressmen Seth Magaziner and Gabe Amo today announced $1,999,777 in federal funding for the Aquidneck Land Trust under the Climate Resilience Regional Challenge.
The Aquidneck Land Trust will serve as the host organization for the award, working closely with the City of Newport, the Town of Middletown, the Town of Portsmouth, and Naval Station Newport. Funding will grow an island-wide approach to resilience through capacity building by offering technical assistance and outlining actionable strategies for responding to climate change. The project will allow for collaborations across a network of partners to implement regional resilience projects that include nature-based solutions to address threats from flooding, sea level rise, and water pollution.
“Coastal communities are on the front lines of climate change and face unique climate challenges – from flooding to water pollution to sea level rise,” said Reed. “This federal funding will help the Aquidneck Land Trust and its partners work collaboratively to strengthen their collective resiliency to the impacts of climate change. I applaud their cooperative approach to mitigating the impacts of climate change for future generations and look forward to seeing the results of their work in these Rhode Island communities.”
“Thanks to our Inflation Reduction Act, we’re accelerating climate resiliency across the Ocean State,” said Whitehouse, who developed the National Coastal Resilience Fund, a national endowment for restoring and strengthening natural infrastructure protecting coastal communities. “This federal funding will provide a big boost to resiliency and conservation projects on Aquidneck Island and help strengthen our defenses against climate change.”
“As a coastal state, Rhode Island is at the forefront of the climate crisis and we need to invest in solutions that will protect Rhode Islanders and their livelihoods,” said Magaziner. “This federal funding will support climate resiliency efforts that will protect working people across our state from sea level rise and severe flooding.”
“As the Ocean State, coastal management is essential to protecting our communities and our way of life from the existential threat of climate change,” said Amo. “That is why I am proud to have joined my colleagues in supporting the Aquidneck Land Trust in their quest to receive nearly $2 million in federal funding. This federal investment will help expand their island-wide approach to resilience and leverage nature-based solutions to fight the climate crisis.”
The Climate Resilience Regional Challenge is administered by the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and was created through the Inflation Reduction Act, which Senators Reed and Whitehouse helped pass. The grant program allows coastal communities to implement transformative, resilience-building initiatives that build capacity to reduce regional climate risk and help prepare for climate change.
“The Land Trust is proud to partner with Middletown, Portsmouth, and Newport, as well as the Navy, in service of helping our island become more resilient to the impacts of a changing climate,” said Terry Sullivan, Executive Director of Aquidneck Land Trust.
“This is a huge opportunity to address the growing climate issues we face as one island community,” said Paige Myatt, Project Director for the award. “We realize that the capacity to tackle these challenges needs to be multiplied. There is a lot of momentum to maintain, and this project allows us to grow this work in a meaningful way.”
