Joselyn Institute to hold lecture on Climate Change

July 6, 2018, 2:40 a.m. ·

The Joselyn Institute for Sustainable Communities will host a lecture on Thursday, July 12 to discuss the impact climate change has on a community’s quality of life.

The lecture, which will take place in the Do Space at Metro Community College in Omaha, will include panelists from the local, regional and national level to discuss the effect climate change has on community sustainability.

Joselyn Institute president and CEO W. Cecil Steward defined community sustainability as a community that seeks to balance five holistic strategies: Environmental and sociocultural issues, technology, economics and public policy.

“A sustainable community will seek balance and recognize the interdependence among and between all of those domains in order to achieve the best possible living standard,” he said.

Steward is one of the panelists attending the lecture next week, alongside University of Nebraska Medical Center professor and climate science advisor to the White House Jesse Bell and director of the Nebraska State Climate Office Martha Shulski.

Steward said that, rather than debating the validity of climate change, people must begin looking for ways to continue to improve quality of life in their communities amidst an ever-changing environment.

“I’m hoping that among the messages that each of us bring we will have some folks that come to an-ha moment and then begin to work from their own residence,” Steward said.