Florida Silver Jackets

STATE OF FLORIDA SILVER JACKETS TEAM CHARTER

The Florida Silver Jackets is an implementation sub-committee of the State of Florida Mitigate FL Working Group dedicated to creating a collaborative environment to bring together Federal, State, and local partners to develop and implement solutions to flood risk management problems. 

VISION STATEMENT

A collaborative effort to develop comprehensive and sustainable solutions to Florida's flood hazards.

MISSION STATEMENT

As an intergovernmental team of federal, state, and local agencies, Silver Jackets will provide opportunities to work collectively on flood management issues to:

• Identify and prioritize actions to reduce the threat and vulnerability of flooding in the State of Florida;
• Facilitate strategic planning and implementation of life-cycle mitigation and recovery actions to reduce the threat and vulnerability of flooding in the State of Florida;
• Increase and improve flood risk outreach and education;
• Identify and implement strategies to leverage available resources and information between agencies

Team Activities

The Immokalee Regional Water Plan

The Immokalee region in southwest Florida experiences numerous water-related issues, from flooding in the developed areas and on the Seminole Tribe's Immokalee Reservation to a lack of water in the natural systems of Big Cypress National Preserve and Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge. This project brought together federal, Tribal, state, and local entities to create a joint vision of water management in the Immokalee region that benefits all partners. The Immokalee Regional Water Plan describes water problems, solutions, and actions agreed upon by all partners and will serve as the foundation for future water management projects in southwest Florida.

The Immokalee Regional Water Plan (pdf, 6.29 MB)

Florida Coastal Resilience Workshop

The Florida Coastal Resilience Workshop for planners and engineers is a Florida Silver Jackets initiative conducted between April and June of 2022 to increase community resilience to coastal storms and sea level rise and facilitate compliance with state laws, statutes, and requirements by providing hands-on training with tools developed by state and federal agencies to assess, communicate, and address risk to Florida communities.

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Lake Martin Flood Management Study

The development of a hydrologic and hydraulic (H&H) model and analysis of flood management opportunities was completed for the Lake Martin Basin in Bay County, FL. The scope of this study included defining flood risk drivers and at-risk areas within the basin, identifying potential solutions to reduce flood risk, and analyzing the effectiveness of identified measures.

Lake Martin Flood Management Study (pdf, 5.51 MB)

Resilience Guidebooks Rural Inland Counties in Florida

The State of Florida Silver Jackets Team implemented the Inland Community Resiliency Project that supported the rural inland counties of Columbia and Highlands. The project included preparing a guidebook with proposed solutions to reduce identified risks and building a network of relationships between county emergency mangers, state agencies and federal agencies to improve resilience. Currently scaled to achieve increased community resilience at the county level, this work also serves as a pilot project that could be applied to other rural counties in Florida and across the nation. 

Highlands County Guidebook (pdf, 6.25MB)
Highlands County Workbook (pdf, 10.9MB)
Columbia County Guidebook (pdf, 4.99MB)
Columbia County Workbook (pdf, 11.3MB)