WILLIAMSBURG – The Town of Williamsburg and the Mill River Greenway Committee, in partnership with Hilltown Land Trust and the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission, is launching a series of workshops focusing on climate resilience strategies for residents. The “Climate Smart Landscapes at Home and Work” workshop series will include five sessions focused on various best practices for mitigating the impacts of climate change.
“We’re thrilled to bring these workshops to the Town of Williamsburg and proud to partner with the Hilltown Land Trust to make these happen,” said Kimberly H. Robinson, Executive Director of PVPC. “Mitigating climate change is the great challenge of our time, ensuring that communities and residents are protected and prepared for increasingly extreme weather patterns.”
The series will be hosted at Meekins Library on Saturday mornings in the months of March, April, and May. The workshops will run from 9:00 to 10:30 AM. All Williamsburg residents are welcome to attend, and attendees will be offered breakfast treats and coffee during the workshops.
The “Climate Smart Landscapes at Home and Work” workshops will include interactive presentations from professional land use and environmental planners, landscape designers, and landscape architects. The workshops are intended to provide a broad selection of strategies well suited for use on residential or small-business properties. The sessions will occur on the following Saturdays:
- March 30 – Mapping Stormflows at Home and Work, Courteny Morehouse, Member of the Upper Mill River Watershed Project Team
- April 6 – Soak up the Rain: It’s All About the Soil, Patty Gambarini and W. Kyle Finnell, Pioneer Valley Planning Commission
- April 13 – Harvesting Rainwater: Cisterns and Rain Barrels, Patty Gambarini and W. Kyle Finnell, Pioneer Valley Planning Commission
- April 27 – Soak up the Rain: Rain Gardens and Bioswales, Rachel Lindsay, Regenerative Design Group
- May 4 – Soak up the Rain: Porous Paving, Rachel Loeffler, Berkshire Design Group
Residents interested in attending are encouraged to pre-register to assist with planning purposes, but registration is not required. Registration for all workshops is available on the Hilltown Land Trust website.
The “Climate Smart Landscapes at Home and Work” workshop series is part of the Upper Mill River Watershed Planning for Flood Resilience project, funded through the Commonwealth’s Municipal Vulnerability Preparedness (MVP) program, a two-year project that will conclude in the Summer of 2025.
For more information about the “Climate Smart Landscape at Home and Work” series, contact W. Kyle Finnell, Senior Planner at the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission, at kfinnell@pvpc.org. For additional information on the Upper Mill River Watershed Planning for Flood Resilience project, contact Gaby Immerman, Chair of the Mill River Greenway Committee, at millrivergreenway@burgy.org.
ABOUT THE HILLTOWN LAND TRUST
Hilltown Land Trust works to conserve ecologically important wildlands, economically and culturally important working lands, and the scenic beauty and rural character of the Hilltowns. The service area includes 13 rural towns: Ashfield, Chester, Chesterfield, Conway, Cummington, Goshen, Huntington, Middlefield, Plainfield, Westhampton, Williamsburg, Windsor, and Worthington. Since its founding in 1986, the Land Trust has protected and continue to steward over 5,000 acres of land.