The Resiliency of Pittsburgh
March 29, 2019
From its previous history as the center of steelmaking and heavy industry, Pittsburgh has emerged as a cosmopolitan center of technology, entrepreneurship and education. As part of the direction of improving the environment and the city’s capabilities, Pittsburgh received a grant from the Rockefeller 100 Cities Initiative to improve the resilience of the City of Pittsburgh. To support this activity, Grant Ervin was announced as the Chief Resilience Officer of Pittsburgh. This presentation details the journey that he and the city took together to develop and implement the OnePGH plan to improve the resilience and quality of life in Pittsburgh.
Grant Ervin serves as the Chief Resilience Officer and Assistant Director for the Department of City Planning for the City of Pittsburgh. Grant oversees the integration of sustainability and resilience into City of Pittsburgh’s services, programs and policy. He works to make the City of Pittsburgh a smart, sustainable and resilient city by fostering partnerships, leveraging assets and finding creative ways to solve problems. Prior to joining the City of Pittsburgh, Grant served as the Regional Director for 10,000 Friends of Pennsylvania, a statewide sustainable development policy organization where he focused on land use, transportation finance and infrastructure policy; and as Public Policy Manager for Pittsburgh Community Reinvestment Group (PCRG).
Mr. Ervin serves as an integrator by working across departments, agencies and sectors to formulate sustainable and resilient solutions. He brings deep experience, intersecting the worlds of environmental, energy, technology, community & economic development and infrastructure policy to create innovative and sustainable solutions for the public, private and non-governmental sectors.
Mr. Ervin has helped lead the development of a variety of innovative programs including: Pittsburgh’s ONEPGH Resilience Strategy, Pittsburgh Climate Plan, Pittsburgh’s inclusion in the Rockefeller Foundation’s 100 Resilient Cities Initiative; Bloomberg Philanthropies – American Cities Climate Challenge, Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy, United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, the United States Department of Transportation’s Smart Cities Challenge, the creation of the Uptown Eco-Innovation District, District Energy Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh and Neighborhood Community Information System and the Pennsylvania Community Transportation Initiative.
Mr. Ervin has senior management experience in energy portfolio management, the evaluation and deployment of clean technologies and renewable and district scale power procurement. Mr. Ervin speaks frequently on topics ranging from urbanism, urban resilience, organizational sustainability strategies, smart cities and climate change and cities.