Transcript
What inspires you from WFSU Public Media? Here's this week's Voices That Inspire. My name is Abina Ojetayo. I'm the Chief Resilience Officer for the City of Tallahassee. In my role, I think a lot about shocks and stressors in the urban context. And a shock is any kind of discrete event that, as the word suggests, shocks the system for the city. So we know it in our community a lot through hurricanes and through storms. And then the more interesting part is the stressors. The stressors are those slow moving disasters. Those things that take time, but they slowly erode at the quality of life for cities. I think about how we build in reliability in our infrastructure and our systems, particularly because we are full service city. And then I think a lot about vulnerable populations in our community. I think about people that are unsheltered, the disabled, the elderly, those that depend on the bigger, the broader community in times of shock. And then how do we create systems and institutionalize ways to live better in our city, to build a better city so that we can remove those vulnerabilities? My inspiration in really what keeps me going is my faith. Being poured into week in, week out at my church, my family, and being reminded that life isn't just what is directly in front of me right now right here. I know there's a lot of good conversation about being present right here, but being present and being effective right now, I think requires understanding that there's more to life than just right here right now, that we're working towards something, that there is a better place somewhere and that we have a role to play to make that a reality, you know, this side of heaven. So that's what inspires me every day. I've been out of Jotayo and the Chief Resilience Officer for the City of Tallahassee. You're listening to voices that inspire. For more information, visit wfsu.org.