Audubon North Carolina is partnering with stakeholders and residents in Tyrrell County to find nature-based solutions that address flooding, degraded wetlands, and a history of underfunding through the Building Resilient Communities with Nature project.

Flooding as a result of sea level rise, increasingly high tides, and intense storms demolish coastal bird habitat and have all kinds of negative impacts on community roads, yards, houses, and businesses. These long-term issues affect many aspects of community life, including jobs and local economies, housing and infrastructure, recreation opportunities, and the area's beautiful natural wonders and wildlife. This includes impacts to aging water control and management systems that no longer function as designed due at least in part to  the amount of water communities are now dealing with. 

Northern Tyrrell County, including the unincorporated community of Alligator and the Town of Columbia, have been identified by Audubon’s Coastal Carolinas Blueprint as areas where nature-based solutions can improve the lives of birds and people. Through this project, we strive to support our community partners in becoming more resilient and prepared in the face of long-term impacts like sea-level rise, while also safeguarding key bird habitats like marshes, beaches, and barrier islands. 

Project Goals and Objectives 

The main goals of this community-based resilience project include: 

• Partnering with communities to co-create and prioritize a list of potential nature-based solutions that benefit both people and birds by addressing challenges identified by community members and stakeholders.
• ​Increasing community capacity to engage in resilience planning. 
• Foster trust and mutual understanding among organizational partners, local decision makers, and community members and stakeholders. 

To accomplish these goals, the project team will follow the process outlined below. The project team will begin by building relationships and facilitating open dialogue with community members and stakeholders in northern Tyrrell County, and engaging with them to gather feedback on and insight into local challenges. Then, the team will compile local social and environmental data to feed into a vulnerability assessment, which will help identify areas that are most vulnerable to community-identified challenges, such as flooding. Finally, the project team will co-develop a list of potential nature-based solutions with community members and stakeholders, which can then be used for future funding applications for project implementation. 
 

Learn more about this project, or get involved, by clicking on the icons below!