SLECC Key Challenges and State and Local Solutions Database
Challenge/Local/State
Staff turnover and short grant cycles erase institutional memory. Lessons learned disappear, past engagement findings are lost, and communities are repeatedly asked to re-explain their needs from scratch as new staff inherit processes without context or continuity.
Challenge/Local/State
Fragmented interagency coordination means policy changes and program requirements are implemented in silos without consulting affected communities, creating duplicative burdens and repeated cycles of communities navigating the same disconnects across agencies.
Challenge/Local/State
Rigid state processes and funding structures limit flexibility and hinder community-centered solutions. Bureaucratic timelines, inflexible reporting requirements, and grants locked into pre-set deliverables leave little room to respond to real-world changes—such as cost spikes or staff turnover—constraining adaptive, community-driven work.
Challenge/Local/State
Provide state/local training to build institutional knowledge and reduce turnover impacts. Training enables continuity even when staff changes.
Challenge/Local/State
Encourage reuse of past community input and needs assessments to prevent redundant engagement and fatigue
Challenge/Local/State
State should discontinue or substantially reform its reliance on CalEnviroScreen as the primary eligibility tool for disadvantaged community designations, replacing it with locally validated data including general plan updates, local action plans, income data, and health equity indicators that more accurately capture on-the-ground conditions.
Challenge/Local/State
Build community capacity to advocate for itself (supporting residents to tell their own stories about the economic, physical, social, and psychological impacts of climate and disinvestment on their lives) rather than relying on technical assessments or government spokespersons to describe community conditions.
Challenge/Local/State
Devolve decision-making structures away from state-level processes driven primarily by politics and toward those grounded in local data and planning; recognizing that centralized control over economic development and climate priorities has systematically disadvantaged smaller communities and removed local agency over what gets funded and prioritized.
Challenge/Local/State
Create shared definitions and standards for equitable engagement. Addresses inconsistency across agencies and partners.
Challenge/Local/State
Integrate diversity management plans and oversight in state procurement contracts to ensure inclusive subcontracting
Challenge/Local/State
Require professional project managers on large-scale state-funded community projects (as is already standard in federal procurement)
Challenge/Local/State
Provide technical assistance grants to smaller cities and rural jurisdictions to level the playing field
Challenge/Local/State
Fund statewide qualitative data repositories (like open data portals but for community stories and feedback)
Challenge/Local/State
Standardize institutional memory systems — requiring grantees to archive engagement results for future use
Challenge/Local/State
Require qualitative data collection and sharing alongside quantitative reporting in state grants
Challenge/Local/State
Require minimum funding set-asides for engagement activities in all major grants
Challenge/Local/State
Advocate for flexible grant structures that allow adjustments for cost overruns, staffing changes, or shifting priorities
Challenge/Local/State
Provide technical assistance to smaller cities and CBOs for grant applications
Challenge/Local/State
Establish regional or state-level repositories for qualitative data and community feedback (akin to data portals for quantitative info)
Challenge/Local/State
Incorporate professional project managers into large-scale community projects (as is required in federal procurement) to improve delivery and reduce coalition breakdowns
Help us to expand this database. Either share new ideas, best practices or general feedback via this form, or click on a particular item to share additional feedback, information, examples of progress on that particular item.
