City of Miami Climate Resilience Committee Meeting – April 6, 2026
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City of Miami Climate Resilience Committee Meeting – April 6, 2026
The City of Miami Climate Resilience Committee met on April 6, 2026, at 6:01 PM to hear expert presentations, discuss ongoing resilience efforts, and plan future priorities. The meeting featured a presentation on climate trends by Dr. Ben Kirtman from the University of Miami and a presentation on resilient economic strategies by Aries, founder of the Resilience Action Fund. The committee approved previous meeting minutes, received updates from the Office of Resilience and Sustainability, and outlined a schedule for budget workshops and a tree policy workshop.
Consent Calendar
- Approval of Minutes: The committee unanimously approved the minutes from the March 2, 2026 and March 23, 2026 meetings.
Public Comments & Testimony
- Albert Gomez (District 2 resident) urged the committee to match climate science with policy, citing the recent single-use plastic ordinance as a positive example. He suggested the committee pass a resolution supporting the annual Biscayne Bay Marine Health Summit to encourage commissioner participation. He expressed concern about the streamlining of tree permit processes and requested that the upcoming tree workshop not be delayed past April, emphasizing that the tree canopy directly addresses flooding and heat issues.
Presentations
- Dr. Ben Kirtman (University of Miami climate modeler) presented on global and regional climate trends: persistent warming, accelerating sea level rise, a possible climate shift in 2023 partly linked to the Hunga Tonga eruption, and increasing extreme rainfall. He highlighted that overnight temperatures are warming fastest in the Southeast, and that the heat index in Miami is rising at 0.61°F per decade. Sea level at Virginia Key is expected to exceed six inches above mean high tide for over 50 days per year by mid-century under best scenarios. He stressed the need for hyperlocal, high-resolution data and called for collaboration between scientists and decision-makers, offering the University of Miami as a convener. He also noted the NMME project forecasting a potential "super El Niño" for the coming winter, which may reduce hurricane activity if Atlantic warmth does not offset it.
- Aries (founder, Resilience Action Fund) presented "Resilientomics," a strategy linking resilience to wealth formation. He criticized current codes, noting that Miami has world-class wind standards but weak water standards. He recommended increasing freeboard (height above base flood elevation) to match Houston's 500-year plus two feet standard. He introduced the Building Resilience Index (BRI) used by the World Bank, which rates buildings on wind, fire, seismic, and water—Miami's weakest link is water. He cited a study showing low-elevation homes in Tampa sold for 35% below purchase price after Hurricane Milton, while high-elevation homes sold for 25% above, a 60% spread. He urged the city to identify and prioritize resilience zones (land above 10 feet), redevelop transit-oriented corridors, and prepare for insurance and lending markets that will increasingly penalize non-resilient properties.
Discussion Items
- Old Business – Workshop on Plastic-Free Events: The committee reported that following their February workshop, the city commission passed a plastic-free resolution unanimously. The committee decided not to take further action, expressing satisfaction with the city's progress.
- Office of Resilience and Sustainability Updates: Chief Resilience Officer Sonia Burbaker announced Earth Month outreach events (Bayonanza, River Day, Cleo 5K), tree giveaways every Saturday in April, and a three-month composting pilot starting May 1 at five city locations (City Hall, Miami River Center, Charles Hadley Park, Morningside Park, Shenandoah Park). She also promoted the upcoming Greater Miami Chamber Resilient Solutions Summit (May 6) and the Biscayne Bay Marine Health Summit (May 20).
- Open Discussion – Focus Areas for 2026: Members expressed interest in revisiting freeboard requirements and the stormwater master plan. The committee agreed to request a presentation on the stormwater master plan update and capital improvement progress. Members also discussed the need for a tree canopy workshop and invited staff to provide data on tree permits and giveaways, which had been received.
Key Outcomes
- The committee will request a presentation on the stormwater master plan update for a future meeting.
- A budget recommendation workshop will be held in May (date to be determined) to develop priorities for the city's budget, with public input collected at the April 30 meeting.
- A tree policy workshop will be scheduled for May, before a proposed presentation from the New York City Parks Department on their tree canopy work.
- The committee will follow up on the public benefits agreed upon in recent marina lease negotiations (Coconut Grove Yacht Club and Miami Yacht Club).
- Committee members will review the tree permit data and tree trust fund information provided by staff.
Meeting Transcript
Car seats e-boosters proporcionan protection a los bebés and niños and the City of Miami Climate Resilience Committee for March 2nd, 2026. Very excited to be starting off at 6.01 PM. This is fantastic. So we will start with item one roll call from my right, please. Good evening, Grant Musher. Alison Weinstock. Aaron DeMeyo. Your Labagay. Good evening, Wayne Pathman. Thank you so much. And now Miriam, please. Miriam Flores. Sonia Burbaker, Chief Resilance Officer. Gigi Solomon, also city attorney. Thank you. All right, we have uh a sub-item under roll call today to welcome our newest member. Very excited to have you here uh serving with us and excited to see Mayor Higgins um commitment and interest in in a in an appointment after her uh election. Welcome if you want to say a few words. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Um, I'm really excited to be part of this committee, um, representing the mayor. She is very, very involved in resilience issues, and I'm so pleased to see that um the plastic ordinance passed recently. Uh just one of the many initiatives that I'm sure we will um move forward. And um I'm just happy to be here help make Miami more resilient. Wonderful. All right, we'll move to item two, which is public comment. If anyone from the public would like to make a comment, now is the time. I wrote some comments down if you don't mind. Uh good morning, Albert Gomez, uh, district two, uh, resident, uh, good evening, Chair, committee, members, new, and returning. Um, and everyone here and uh listening. Uh tonight, Dr. Ben Kirtman will remind us of climate change. And that climate change and sea level rise, heat and flooding are not future concerns. They're accelerating now. Um, the question before this committee is whether we will match the science with meaningful policy. Um, our opportunity uh is uh our opportunity is to pass ordinances similar to the single use plastic ordinance. Uh these sorts of things can happen every day, and all we have to do is have the political will to do them. Um I I think that there's also convening bodies like the Biscayne Bay Marine Health Summit, which Urella Bages sat on. Um, I acknowledge you uh for joining this. I think you're gonna bring a lot to this committee. Umrdnance like that came from that type of convening. Uh so I would ask uh from previous times, the climate resilience committee and the sea liberal eyes committee before had uh put resolutions forward supporting the Biscayne Bay Marine Health Summit, which happens annually. What that does is it puts it in the commissioner's face that it's happening and gives them an opportunity to participate directly because it's being supported by a board. So I would suggest that you uh we've done it before in the past, so this is not there's precedent for you to bring that forward again so that the new commission, which are all new bodies, man uh many new bodies, could come and so and see that support from the committee and then have to vote on that resolution, and then that further supports uh their push for protecting Biscay Bay. And then um I uh I was um I was a little bit uh perplexed, but I completely understand with the permit um renewals and kind of revisions and fast tracking that's going on. I noticed that uh that there's been some streamlining of the tree permit uh process, and that could uh obviously uh coincides with your request last week for uh all total uh tree permit removal requests and actual removals so that you can have that data ahead of your upcoming workshop. I just um given that uh Dr. Kirtman is speaking today on climate change and flooding and heat, which the canopy addresses flooding and heat directly. Kirtman is speaking today on climate change and flooding and heat, which the canopy addresses flooding and heat directly, um, that we take seriously that these are all the signals that you need the science that you need to make those decisions, and then so put more priority on this workshop, make sure that it doesn't slide past April uh and that we we actually get it done and that we get the data from the the city so that we can make uh thoughtful decisions here on uh and recommendations and I appreciate it. Thank you so much.
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