Topsham invites residents to attend upcoming climate action workshop

Questions about the future impacts of climate change on Topsham residents prompt the town’s Energy Committee to survey citizens about its current impacts.

The committee is hosting a Climate Action Plan workshop on July 30 from 6:30pm to 8pm at Town Hall. The workshop is a follow-up to the more than 250 responses to the Topsham Climate Action Plan survey that closed in May.

Topsham Energy Committee Chair Yvette Meunier and volunteer Nancy Chandler were at the town’s garbage collection facility on Saturday, inviting people to the first community conversation about the plan updates.

“We will put the climate action plan into action,” said Meunier. “We will collect feedback and carry out three different engagement activities.”

Topsham resident Jeff Munson (right) listens to questions about the impacts of climate change on him with Topsham Energy Committee Chair Yvette Meunier (left) and volunteer Nancy Chandler (center) at the Topsham Waste Management Facility on July 13. Paul Bagnall / The Times Record

One of the activities is an interactive tabletop exercise similar to the one Meunier and Chandler conducted at the landfill: They ask people what would make the city more resilient and what resources the city can provide to citizens to help them with sustainability and resilience. This method tracks interests in the different areas where climate change will impact the city. Some of the concerns cited in survey responses came from people living along the Androscoggin River, with culverts and roads being a top concern due to high water levels from increasing rainfall.

Topsham’s Energy Committee has received a $50,000 Community Resilience Partnership Program grant from the Governor’s Office of Policy Innovation and Futures. The money will be used to engage the consulting team FB Environmental to help the committee develop an updated Climate Action Plan that will be presented to the town for a vote at the annual town meeting by May 2025.

The Midcoast Council of Governments is writing the greenhouse gas initiative for the plan. A new aspect of the plan is the Maine Social Vulnerability Assessment, which examines who is most affected by climate change.

Meunier said the most vulnerable in our population do not have the means to bear some of the increased electricity prices and live in places more vulnerable to flooding.

“At a future meeting, we will begin to organize our priorities in the plan,” Meunier said.

Some sustainability measures include natural resource protection, food security, infrastructure, electrification, water quality, and invasive species such as bittersweet and Japanese knotweed.

The Energy Committee was created in October 2020 and unanimously approved by the Topsham Select Board. Meunier said the committee helped draft the solar panel zoning ordinance and solar power purchase agreement for Topsham, saving the town $38,000, before becoming an official committee.

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