Improving Canada’s Resilience to Flooding

·  In order to support the development of this Strategy, Public Safety Canada co-chaired a Disaster Resilience and Security Advisory Table which included diverse stakeholders, including representatives from the National Indigenous Organizations, non-governmental-organizations, academia, industry associations, and others. The Strategy represents a shared vision for climate resilience in Canada, supports improving resilience to flooding, and complements investments in this research project.

·  Of the over $585,000 in federal funding announced today:

·  $318,359 will come from Public Safety Canada’s Policy Development Contribution Program; and

·  $270,000 will come from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.

·  The Insurance Bureau of Canada is also providing funding of $30,991 for the research project.

·  Public Safety Canada’s Policy Development Contribution Program (PDCP) supports strategic projects undertaken by the Department’s stakeholders that contribute to policy making and improved service delivery, in the areas of public safety and emergency management.

·  The program funds an average of 5-6 projects each fiscal year. Projects are cost-shared, where total government funding at all levels makes up no more than 95 per cent of the total project costs.

·  Since 2019, the Government of Canada has moved forward on a number of initiatives, in collaboration with all orders of government and stakeholders, to improve resiliency and flood mitigation. This includes:

·  Investing $63.8M over three years for the Flood Hazard Identification and Mapping Program to complete flood hazard mapping of higher-risk areas and to make this flood hazard information accessible, in partnership with provinces and territories, and to advance consistent best practices and flood mapping approaches across Canadian jurisdictions;

·  A review of the Disaster Financial Assistance Arrangements program to ensure there is an updated, sustainable system available to provinces and territories for disaster recovery and for the safety and well-being of Canadians;

·  Advancing work on a National Risk Profile, which is a strategic national risk and capability assessment that uses scientific evidence and stakeholder input to identify, compare, and prioritize which hazards are the most concerning; and, where there are gaps in our ability to prevent, mitigate, respond, and recover from disasters across all hazards. The National Risk Profile includes a hazard-specific stream focused on flooding, which coordinates the development of whole-of-government flood risk policy and direction on activities related to flood risk awareness, engagement and education;

·  Integrating climate resilience into the National Building Code and conducting research to factor climate resilience into the design of buildings; and

·  Through the Disaster Mitigation and Adaptation Fund, delivered by Infrastructure Canada, providing funding for infrastructure projects, to help communities better withstand the potential impacts of natural hazards such as floods.