About Climate Change Working Group of Frederick County
The Climate Change Working Group of Frederick County (CCWG) was founded in 2016, to bring together community volunteers to share knowledge, research climate change impacts, and develop recommendations to address them at the local level. Since then, the recognition of global biodiversity loss has increased the scope of our work. We produce reports, newspaper editorials and white papers, advocate for our recommendations and educate the public. Areas of interest/concern include food, land use, transportation, energy, water, health, ecosystem preservation, and the economy. We embrace systems thinking, which Wikipedia defines as “a way of making sense of the complexity of the world by looking at it in terms of wholes and relationships rather than by splitting it down into its parts. It has been used as a way of exploring and developing effective action in complex contexts, enabling systems change…”
Vision: A resilient creative community, with a healthy local economy that is independent of fossil fuels. Some things this might mean include:
- An electric public transportation system along well-planned population corridors that reduces reliance on cars,
- A local ecosystem returned to balance, with wildlife corridors that connect fragmented habitats and allow plant and animal species to shift north along the Appalachians, a globally important migration corridor,
- Protected water sources that are safe and sufficient for aquatic species, agriculture, wildlife and humans to thrive,
- Abundant employment opportunities that enrich the community via profits that circulate locally
- Zero-waste policies and practices
Mission: We seek to address the local impacts of climate change and habitat loss through research, planning, education and advocacy.
We welcome alliance and cooperative work with others seeking similar goals. CCWG affiliations include the Frederick County Smarter Growth Alliance, the Catoctin Land Trust, the Heart of Maryland Conservation Alliance, Envision Frederick County, the Fellowship of Scientists and Engineers and Mobilize Frederick. We work with partner organizations to influence City/County government policies and legislation.