Over the past two years, Hampton Roads localities, including Virginia Beach and Norfolk, four Cabinet Departments of Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe, 11 federal agencies (including the Department of Defense), the Virginia Port Authority, a variety of private businesses and three non-profits, worked together in a White House-announced intergovernmental pilot project convened by Old Dominion University to figure out how to build coastal resilience in the face of increasing sea level rise. Old Dominion University organized the effort to focus on different aspects of this regional challenge. Led by a steering committee, volunteers focused on legal issues, infrastructure, citizen engagement, public health, science and economic impacts. Sample recommendations and next steps will be presented, including how an integrated regional approach using the whole of government methodology can be operationalized.

Ray Toll is the Director of Coastal Resilience Research at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, where he has been the primary facilitator in developing a whole of government/community approach to regional planning to mitigate and adapt to sea level rise. This pilot was one of several in the country dealing with climate change and resiliency. He also served on Governor McAuliffe's Climate Change and Resiliency Update Commission. Mr. Toll is a retired Navy Captain who worked in Naval Oceanography for 26 years. Following the Navy, he worked in the private sector, dealing mainly with Earth Science programs, models and data bases. He is the Immediate Past President of the Marine Technology Society and serves on a number of Boards, including the Virginia Aquarium and Marine Science Center, the Middle Atlantic Coastal Ocean Observing System, and in October 2012 chaired OCEANS 2012.

CCPO Innovation Research Park Building I 4111 Monarch Way, 3rd Floor Old Dominion University Norfolk, VA 23508 757-683-4940