Following Through with Local Climate Change Action: Investigating the Implementation Gap and Municipal Funding Strategies

While cities have been actively working on climate change policymaking for the last 20 years and have regularly been held up as a solution to climate change policymaking shortcomings in the United States, scholars have noted a gap in the implementation of climate change policy. Investigations have revealed that staffing, local institutions, and funding have all factored into this gap, yet it persists around the country in different types of municipal governments. This research seeks to better investigate the funding dimensions of local climate policymaking, particularly how the challenges of federalism and local institutions continue to impact cities and their need for long-term support. Institutional theories of policymaking are used alongside qualitative investigation of funding opportunities, municipal plans, and interviews with southern and western municipalities about the specific shortcomings in funding that continue to remain challenging for implementation. Findings reveal that the historical institutional patterns of federal funding continue to take shape within newer arenas like climate change and that the types and availability of grants provide challenges for city implementation, particularly for smaller cities that lack the needed structures and capacity for implementation.