Private, non-for-profit and public organizations partner to better protect Toronto residents from severe weather

More than 50 public, private and not-for-profit organizations from across Toronto region have banded together to better protect the region’s residents, organizations, infrastructure and environment from extreme weather.
The WeatherWise Partnership, convened by the City of Toronto and CivicAction, will identify risks and prioritize areas for action and investment by businesses, communities, organizations and governments as the Toronto region faces more extreme rain, snow, wind and temperatures.
Over the coming year, the group will develop a strategic action plan to be shared widely at a regional forum in late 2012, a CivicAction release says.
The partnership includes three levels of government and representatives from many sectors including financial, insurance, communications, real estate, electrical, universities and transportation. It has identified the continuation of electrical power during extreme weather events as its first priority. Future areas of focus may include urban transportation, flooding and extreme heat.
CivicAction noted the amount of money paid out in insurance claims to cover damage from extreme weather events globally is 20 times higher now than it was in the 1950s. “For each of the past three years, insurance companies in Canada have paid out an unprecedented $1 billion to policy holders affected by extreme weather events,” said Glenn McGillivray, managing director of the Institute for Catastrophic Loss Reduction (ICLR). ICLR is a partner in the WeatherWise initiative. He added that by mid-2011, the industry had already surpassed the previous record for losses set in 2005 (on Aug. 19, 2005, a severe storm hit the Greater Toronto Area, resulting in more than $500 million in insured damages. The event is the most costly in Ontario history).
WeatherWise is based on similar partnerships in the cities of London, UK and New York City.