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Some 43 community members and 39 officials from San Jose, Costa Rica participated in GEM’s resilience performance and social vulnerability evaluation using GEM’s Resilience Performance Scorecard (RPS). The Municipality of San Jose, the National Commission of Emergencies (CNE) of Costa Rica, the National Laboratory of Materials and Structural Models (LANAME) from the University of Costa Rica and USAID supported the workshop held from June 15-16.

The objective was to empower stakeholders of disaster management institutions and leaders of the community to assess earthquake risk and resilience using innovative data collection technologies. This assessment allows the stakeholders to identify the achievements and the gaps in the resilience of the city. The first draft of the report of the results will be ready in September and will be made public once the report has been approved by the Municipality of San Jose and the CNE of Costa Rica. The RPS workshop is part of GEM’s Assessing and Mitigating Earthquake Risk in the Caribbean and Central America (CCARA) Project.

The objectives of the project are: to develop capacity in the region of Central America and the Caribbean for earthquake risk assessment by leveraging GEM tools and resources, to enhance the understanding of earthquake risk, and to bridge the gap between risk assessment and disaster risk reduction. GEM’s RPS is being used as an essential step to understand and enhance the resilience of cities to earthquakes by measuring baseline conditions of what makes communities resilient.