The Environmental Resilience Institute’s Resilience Cohort program helps Indiana city, town, and county governments understand the local implications of climate change and implement climate adaptation strategies.
Participants join a cohort of peers, and each local government receives one-on-one guidance, attends cohort training webinars, gains the opportunity to host aMcKinney Climate Fellow, and more. Through this program, dozens of local governments in Indiana have taken steps to address climate change.
The application period for the 2025 Resilience Cohort has closed. Check back here in September 2025 for details on the next iteration of this program.
Application to the Cohort includes an application to host a McKinney Climate Fellow. See the application for links to ERI’s MCF Policy Handbook and Collaboration Letter (2024 versions, updates coming soon).
Cohort communities contribute a $3,700 membership fee to offset a small portion of the overall costs of expert consultants, and scholarships paid to the Fellows. Memberships will be invoiced by ERI. Cohort communities should budget for potential additional minor expenses like printing; fellowship hosting costs such as office space, computer equipment, or supplies; and limited in-state travel.
An embedded student fellow for 400 hours over the summer
Access to trusted subject-matter experts
Professional skill-building for local government staff
Significantly subsidized costs, including free equipment and installation
Participants invest an average of 5-7 hours per week on Cohort activities during the summer. Participants attend Cohort trainings and workshops, lead activities and engagement within their own community, and supervise the Fellow. Both Cohorts will require a small amount of staff time before and after the fellowship period.
The 2025 Resilience Cohort Program supports two tracks:
Heat pumps are a proven, highly efficient technology that enjoy significant federal, state, and utility incentives. However, in Indiana, contractors face hurdles in offering heat pumps, and even the most motivated consumers struggle to find informed and willing installers. The Heat Pump Accelerator will build awareness of this technology among both building owners and HVAC contractors to speed up the flow of incentive dollars and heat pump benefits into Hoosier households and local economies.
Cohort members will work closely with ERI and its technical partners to:
Build a local contractor network and provide training and resources
Educate building owners to create a pipeline of informed potential customers
Facilitate installation of heat pumps free-of-cost for three community organizations
Host a full-time McKinney Climate Fellow over the summer
Contribute data and stories to grow statewide interest
The Accelerator provides training, professional services, and energy efficient equipment with an estimated value of over $117,000. Cohort members will experience the Heat Pump Accelerator in four phases, with the summer “Training” phase requiring the most effort.
Program timeline
Kickoff and Relationship-building, Jan-Apr 2025 – Prepare for contractor, resident, and community partner recruitment. [Member: 1-2 hrs/week]
Training, May-Aug 2025 – Engage contractors and potential customers and provide training. [Member: 5-7 hrs/week and Fellow: 40 hrs/week]
Installation, Aug -Dec 2025 – Facilitate relationships between ERI, contractors, and community partners to install heat pump. [Member: 2-3 hrs/week]
Market Transformation, Jan 2026-Jun 2027 – Support ERI and community partners in data collection and storytelling. [Member: 1-2 hrs/month]
Who should apply?
Utility or local government staff responsible for implementing climate, energy, or sustainability actions, or staff responsible for workforce development or building permitting. Staff member, with their local partners, will need to convene residential-scale contractors, residents and small business owners, and community organizations.
Local governments or utilities with existing energy efficiency, decarbonization, or workforce development goals are especially encouraged to participate in the Heat Pump Accelerator to jump-start progress towards those goals.
Participant slots are limited.
While local governments know that planting trees has many benefits, those benefits vary dramatically by species, location, and health of the tree. ERI’s Urban Green Infrastructure cohort will facilitate a science-backed, equity-based tree planting and maintenance program. The Urban Green Infrastructure Cohort will begin in Spring 2025, with tree planting sites selected by August 2025, and plantings occurring in late Fall.
The Cohort includes a planning phase and an implementation phase. Cohort members will:
Phase 1: Development of Tree Planting Plan
Receive a professional tree canopy assessment
Work with an equity coach
Engage with community members and stakeholders to identify priority tree planting areas
Develop a community-wide tree-planting plan that provides equitable access to the benefits of trees
Phase 2: Implementation of Tree Planting Plan
Receive up to 100 trees to be planted in disadvantaged areas identified in the planting plan
Receive professional planting services
Receive professional watering and tree care for each planted tree
Phase 1 is valued at over $17,000 in professional services and Phase 2 is valued at $125,000 in green infrastructure installation and maintenance. Partners include Davey Resource Group, with funding from the USDA’s Urban and Community Forestry Program.
Who should apply?
Local government staff responsible for overseeing tree planting and maintenance. Regional organizations that coordinate with multiple local governments are encouraged to apply.
Applicants must have at least one federally designated disadvantaged community census tract. While the assessments and planning will include a participant’s entire jurisdiction, all cohort-funded trees must be planted in a designated tract. Limited participant slots are available; however, this program will also welcome a cohort in 2026 and 2027.
16CLIMATE ACTION PLANS INITIATED
10SOLAR-FRIENDLY COMMUNITY DESIGNATIONS ACHIEVED
11EQUITY-BASED TREE PLANTING PLANS DEVELOPED
Program History
The Resilience Cohort program launched in 2019 to help Indiana communities take steps to address climate change locally. The programs has guided communities through creating greenhouse gas inventories, developing climate action plans, expanding urban green infrastructure, and more. Learn more about each program year below.
In 2024, ERI partnered with local governments on two tracks: a climate action accelerator track and urban green infrastructure track.
1. Climate action accelerator
Climate action accelerator participants were trained in “Strategic Doing,” a framework for tackling complex problems, like sustainability, where solutions require extensive collaboration.
Strategic Doing is one method for making measurable, sustained progress in the face of complex challenges. The process lends itself well to implementing climate action plans that offer defined goals but little guidance on how to achieve them.
Through the climate action accelerator, local government staff piloted the model on one high-priority action from their climate action plan.
Participants included Columbus, Fort Wayne, South Bend, Gary, West Lafayette and Evansville.
2. Urban green infrastructure
Urban green infrastructure participants conducted community-wide tree canopy assessments and planted trees in areas that will benefit the most from investment.
Local governments on this track developed a plan to replenish air-cooling tree canopy. Participating communities gathered public input, identified high-priority tree planting areas, and received training in tree planting and maintenance. They also received 100 trees to jumpstart the implementation of their plans.
Participants included Warsaw, Elkhart, Richmond, and Evansville.
In 2023-24, ERI piloted a full-year cohort focused on assessing the climate risks and vulnerabilities communities are facing and developing a climate resilience plan that identifies strategies for adapting to those risks and vulnerabilities.
1. Climate Risk and Vulnerability
In this phase of the program, participants received technical assistance and support from ERI and Geos Institute, following Geos Institute’s Climate Ready Communities planning framework. Participants also received equity and environmental justice training and one-on-one coaching from Hoosier Environmental Council.
Participants included Bloomington, Carmel, Columbus, Gary, Monroe County, New Albany, South Bend, and Terre Haute.
In 2022,ERIrantwoprogram tracks, one focused on climate action planning andthe otherondevelopingurban green infrastructure.Both programs included an in-depthequity training and one-on-one coaching, while translation services helpedparticipantsconductmore inclusive public engagement.
1. Climate Action Planning
In this program, participants utilized their greenhouse gas (GHG) inventories to develop emissions reduction targets and identify strategies to achieve thesereductions with input from residents and other stakeholders.
Participants received in-depth support from ERI and ICLEI, a leading nonprofit organization for local government sustainability. Using their GHG inventories as a baseline, communities modeled expected emissions reductions associated with various strategies, helping them compile strategies to meet their reduction targets.
Some communities focused on their local government operations, prioritizing high-impact actions to achieve emissions reductions, while others are producing community-scale plans focused on emissions reduction strategies across buildings, transportation, industrial sectors, and more.
Participants included Fishers, Huntington, La Porte, Merrillville, South Bend, and two multi-jurisdiction coalitions—one that included Lafayette, West Lafayette, and Tippecanoe County, the other a three-county planning effort led by the Northwestern Indiana Regional Planning Commission and supported by many town, city, and county governments.
2. Developing Urban Green Infrastructure
In this program, participants assessed their local tree canopy and worked with residents to develop equity-centered tree planting plans. In the face of more extreme weather in the Midwest, urban trees can help mitigate flooding, cool air temperatures on hot summer days, and provide habitat for wildlife. Unfortunately, not all residents have equal access to the many benefits urban trees provide.
By looking at issues like access, urban heat islands, and sociodemographic factors, communities identified priority areas to plant trees, helping ensure a more inclusive, resilient future for their residents. Program participants also produced grant application materials to begin implementing their planting plans.
All participants worked with McKinney Climate Fellows to advance their plans and received technical support and guidance from ERI, Davey Resource Group, and many other urban forestry experts from Indiana and the Midwest.
Participants included Fort Wayne, Fishers, Huntington, Lafayette, Merrillville, Tippecanoe County, Terre Haute, West Lafayette, and Zionsville.
In 2021, ERI led two program tracks, one focused on measuring greenhouse gases and the other focused on implementing greenhouse gas reduction strategies.
1. Measuring Greenhouse Gases
In this program, local governments conducted community-scale greenhouse gas inventories. This process involves collecting data on the amount of energy consumed in a community, the carbon emissions associated with energy supplied to the electric grid, a community's vehicle type and fuel usage distribution, and more.
Some communities also completed inventories of emissions from their local government operations, setting them up to develop strategies to reduce direct emissions from government operations.
Communities received in-depth training from ERI and ICLEI, a leading nonprofit organization for local government sustainability, through training webinars and one-on-one technical assistance.
Participants included Cedar Lake, Chesterton, East Chicago, Hammond, Highland, Hobart, Huntington, Indianapolis, Lafayette, Lake County, Lake Station, La Porte (city), LaPorte County, Merrillville, Munster, New Albany, New Castle, Portage, Porter County, Schererville, South Bend, Terre Haute, Tippecanoe County, and Valparaiso.
2. Implementing Climate Action
This program focused on implementing common strategies from climate action plans: increasing the use of solar energy, accelerating electric vehicle deployment, and reducing energy use in water and wastewater treatment. In each of these three focus areas, communities receives training and technical support from industry experts, including the Great Plains Institute, the Electrification Coalition, and the US Department of Energy.
First, communities learned how to lower barriers to residential solar energy in their communities, working towards designation in the SolSmart program, a national program that recognizes local governments who make it faster, easier, and more affordable to go solar.
Next, communities learned how to accelerate the uptake of electric vehicles (EVs) in their communities. Participants hosted events to increase awareness, distributed surveys to better understand barriers, assessed the electrification options for municipal fleets of vehicles, and began developing EV plans.
Finally, guided by experts from the US Department of Energy (DOE), program participants learned how to utilize DOE tools to benchmark, monitor, and reduce energy use in water and wastewater treatment—a major source of local government emissions. The implementation program also included in-depth equity training and one-on-one coaching, as well as translation services to facilitate more inclusive public engagement.
Participants included Bloomington, Carmel, Elkhart, Fishers, Fort Wayne, Gary, Goshen, Lafayette, Michigan City, Richmond, West Lafayette, and Zionsville.
In 2020, ERI worked with ten local governments to develop climate action plans, building on greenhouse gas inventories produced the previous year.
1. Climate Action Planning
In this program, participants utilized their greenhouse gas (GHG) inventories to develop GHG reduction targets and identify strategies to achieve these emissions reductions with input from residents and other stakeholders.
Participants received in-depth support from ERI and ICLEI, a leading nonprofit organization for local government sustainability. Using their GHG inventories as a baseline, communities modeled expected emissions reductions associated with various strategies, helping them compile strategies to meet their reduction targets.
Some communities focused on their local government operations, prioritizing high-impact actions to achieve emissions reductions, while others produced community-scale plans focused on emissions reduction strategies across buildings, transportation, industrial sectors, and more.
Program participants included Carmel, Elkhart, Evansville, Fishers, Fort Wayne, Gary, Goshen, Richmond, West Lafayette, and Zionsville.
In 2019, ERI launched the Resilience Cohort program, working with14 Indiana cities, towns, and counties toproduce greenhouse gas inventories.
Measuring Greenhouse Gases
In this program, local governments conducted community-scale greenhouse gasinventories. This process involves collecting data on the amount of energy consumed in a community, the carbon emissions associated with energy supplied to the electric grid, a community's vehicle type and fuel usage distribution, and more.
Some communities also completed inventories of emissions from their local government operations, setting them up to develop strategies to reduce direct emissions from government operations.
Communities received in-depth training from ERI and ICLEI, a leading nonprofit organization for local government sustainability, through training webinars and one-on-one technical assistance.
Participants included Bloomington, Carmel, Columbus, Delaware County / Muncie, Evansville, Fishers, Fort Wayne, Gary, Greencastle, Goshen, Michigan City, Oldenburg, Richmond, West Lafayette.
1. Climate Risk and Vulnerability
In this program, local governments conducted community-scale greenhouse gas inventories. This process involves collecting data 
