On February 26^th the Economic Resilience Council of the Greater Fort Lauderdale of Commerce hosted the Resilient Broward event at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts Huizinga Pavilion. The event was a powerful example of collaboration and commitment to addressing the complex challenges of resilience in South Florida by key players such as the Greater Fort Lauderdale Chamber, Broward Workshop, Greater Fort Lauderdale Alliance, Marine Research Hub, and Broward County.

After serving as chair of the Economic Resilience council for a year and listening to members of the council, my takeaway was that we needed to find a way to build awareness and momentum on an issue considered by some to be Broward County and South Florida’s greatest challenge. Our message needed to target the business community, who could really drive the change needed, but whose knowledge of the challenges had a wide spectrum. At the end of the day, this is a complex issue, and no solutions can be developed by a single event, but we can make progress.

The idea for the co-sponsored event came at the Broward Workshop’s annual meeting in 2024. I asked Kareen Boutros if she would be willing to work together on a resilience event. The Broward Workshop has their own resilience group, and by working together we could reach a broader audience. Dan Lindblade President of Chamber along with Dr. Jurado serve on the Resilience Committee with the Alliance. And I developed a relationship and had many discussions with Katherine O’Fallon of the Marine Research Hub. Katie is also a current member of the Leadership Broward Class 43, of which there is a class project focused on resilience.

My thought was that if we could get all these groups to row the boat together, and collectively tap into our respective networks, we could put on an event that could be educational, spread awareness, and build momentum. Further, in 2026 Broward County hosts the South Florida Regional Climate Compact, a multiday world class event to which experts from all over the country and world attend.

Planning for the Resilient Broward Event took over 12 months. We experienced challenges with respect to speaker’s schedules and the event location but everyone on the team pulled together in the final 60 days to put on an exceptional event and to build the foundation for a Resilient Broward.

The topics covered in the Resilient Broward event included:

• Broward County resilience plan addressed by Dr. Jennifer Jurado
• New business opportunities in blue economy moderated by Katherine O’Fallon of the Marine Research Hub
• Climate Finance solutions and related risks
• Insurance market impacts with Anita Byer and Representative Chip LaMarca
• Energy Resiliency presentation by Tim Oliver of FP&L.
• The event was moderated by Laurie Jennings
• And closing remarks and call to action delivered by James Donnelly

If you are interested in getting involved with the Greater Fort Lauderdale Economic Resilience Council and supporting their mission to build awareness and drive the change needed, please contact the Greater Fort Lauderdale Chamber of Commerce Economic Resilient Council Chair, Joseph Karl, Chair, Provenance Wealth Advisors at jkarl@provwealth.com.