Iowa City is around a year into a pilot program for community “resilience hubs,” which will provide educational programming and support to residents during times of weather-related emergencies.

According to city documents, the city’s two pilot hubs are the Iowa City Bike Library, 1222 S. Gilbert Ct., and the Neighborhood Centers of Johnson County, which has two locations in Iowa City and a third on the way.

Sarah Gardner, Iowa City’s climate action coordinator, said the pilot program began around a year ago to achieve the city’s climate action goals.

These hubs are commonly mistaken as simply emergency shelters in the event of severe weather, Gardner said, but their actual purpose is quite different. The hubs will act as a conduit of information, education, and support to the communities they serve before, during, and after extreme weather, she said.

Resilience hubs are cropping up across the nation. The Department of Homeland Security website shows nearly 300 hubs all around the U.S., with a handful shown in Iowa — specifically, in Iowa City, Cedar Rapids, and Davenport.

Iowa has recently seen an increase in extreme weather events, especially tornados. According to an article by KCCI, the state saw 122 tornados as of August, breaking a 2004 record of 120 tornados.

The Iowa City Bike Library and the Neighborhood Centers of Johnson County were chosen to be the pilot hubs, as they were already fulfilling similar roles in their communities, Gardner said.

The pilot program is slated to last three years, Gardner said. The first year has been used to plan what each location needs to do to best serve its surrounding community, she said. The final two years will consist of carrying out that plan.

In the future, the city plans to roll out an application so other organizations can apply to be resilience hubs, Gardner said.

According to meeting documents from the city’s climate action commission, the proposed funding for this program is $10,000 in the first year for planning and supplies, and $50,000 for both the second and third years for implementation costs.

The Neighborhood Centers of Johnson County is nearly complete with their planning phase, Rachel Rockwell, the organization’s executive director, said. This planning has helped the organization create overarching goals for the program and identify steps on how to get there, she said.

While the Neighborhood Centers of Johnson County already has strong connections with the communities it is located in, there were still some additional steps to be taken to make these locations ideal resilience hubs, Rockwell said.

Some of those steps include training staff on emergency preparation and relaying information in the different languages spoken in their communities, establishing a way for the organization to receive real-time weather updates, and creating multilingual educational brochures and zines on what to do in a weather emergency, Rockwell said.

Going forward, the Neighborhood Centers of Johnson County plans to determine alternative energy sources for its locations — such as solar energy and backup generators — so they can provide continuous internet and Wi-Fi access, Rockwell said. The organization also wants to train its staff on fundamental mental health crisis training so it can assist struggling residents during and after emergencies, she said.

RELATED: Iowa City Climate Fest celebrates five years

The Iowa City Bike Library anticipates being completed with its planning phase by the end of the year, Audrey Wiedemeier, the organization’s executive director, said. Wiedemeier said the bike library already has a strong rapport with its community, but it needs some infrastructure upgrades to make the space more conducive to gathering as well as more sustainable.

The bike library has been looking into using solar energy and has made changes to the building to help pursue this goal, including improved insulation and window units as well as using LED lighting, Wiedemeier said.

She said the organization has also been contacting members of the community to ask what they would like to see at the bike library to better meet their needs. Some future infrastructure changes include creating more bike repair shop spaces outdoors, installing cooling and shade infrastructure outdoors, and adding a test ride loop outside.

Both Rockwell and Wiedemeier said their organizations plan to cement themselves as resilience hubs even after the three-year pilot program has concluded. Both said the grassroots approach can help programs like this reach more marginalized communities, which makes those communities stronger.

“This kind of grassroots organizing relies on local participation and community-driven efforts and volunteerism, and there's a strong focus on self-sufficiency and resourcefulness and community empowerment that align with this kind of grassroots mentality,” Wiedemeier said.

Resilience hubs can also help make the experience of going through and recovering from an extreme weather event less painful, Rockwell said.

“I think that naturally after a disaster or an emergency, neighbors and community members come together during those times of need,” Rockwell said. “But if you have existing relationships and are aware of resources and a safe place to go to connect with those resources ahead of time, it can really just alleviate a lot of stress, a lot of potential danger, and also potential conflict in neighborhoods and in the community.”