The SRMP process and resulting Plan document form a foundation for DCAMM’s ongoing work to improve the resilience of the Commonwealth’s property portfolio, and will serve as an example for other governments and organizations to reference in their own resilience work.
For DCAMM, a process for planning climate change adaptation and implementing resilient design strategies is an urgent necessity. DCAMM is responsible for facilities management, major public building construction, and real estate services for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The agency directly manages 5.5 million square feet of state buildings (over 6,400 facilities).
The resulting Statewide Resilience Master Plan (SRMP) lays the groundwork for DCAMM to implement resilient building strategies in future projects, and to ensure service continuity for the Commonwealth’s constituents. In addition, the SRMP will inform DCAMM’s consideration of changes to building codes, land use policies, and other guidance documents in order to advance resilient design efforts.
The SRMP process was a year-long study that followed these steps:
- Categorically ranking DCAMM facilities to determine criticality to DCAMM’s mission
- Determining the potential risks to DCAMM facilities through a vulnerability assessment and mapping exercise
- Looking more closely at applying adaptation strategies to three sites determined to be of high criticality and at high risk
- Developing a set of design guidelines to implement resilient building strategies on DCAMM properties
- Integrating these guidelines into DCAMM project controls
Governing the SRMP is an internal Resilience Working Group made up of stakeholder representatives from various DCAMM divisions who meet monthly to workshop the plan, as well as an external Technical Advisory Group who meet quarterly to review the progress of the planning effort.
The SRMP document is now complete, but DCAMM’s efforts to improve resilience at Commonwealth facilities are just getting started. Using the SRMP as a guiding document, the Resilience Working Group will continue to integrate resilience to DCAMM’s project processes, so that existing and future Commonwealth facilities will be able to deliver consistent, reliable services to the public.