Lian Plass

Biography: Lian Plass is a Senior Manager for the Urban Resilience program which provides ULI members, the public, and communities across the United States with information on how buildings, development, and cities can be more resilient in the face of climate change and other environmental vulnerabilities. Lian was inspired to join ULI after her overwhelmingly positive experience with ULI’s 2016 Advisory Services Panel centered on the Arch Creek Basin. Before coming to ULI, Lian served as Sustainability Administrator for the City of North Miami where she led efforts to tackle difficult sustainability and resilience issues. The Arch Creek Basin report demonstrated the importance of resilience-building initiatives within the city and helped make a strong case for funding city-led initiatives to prepare for climate change impacts. Lian has since worked in the private sector as a Senior Planner where she managed a wide range of planning and development projects including site rehabilitation, climate action plans, and code audits. Lian is passionate about applying technology to resolve difficult planning problems equitably, expeditiously, and cost-effectively. This includes leveraging new massive caches of publicly available data to learn more about communities, alongside finding creative ways to convey critical information about development projects and generate engagement in the planning process. Lian applies her knowledge and experience to support the Urban Resilience program’s research, technical assistance, outreach, and education activities including research and report-writing, grant project administration, and event planning for the annual Resilience Summit. Lian holds a Masters of Urban and Regional Planning from the University of Florida, and a Bachelors of Arts in Sustainable Development from Columbia University.