Virginia Office of Resilience

The Virginia Office of Resilience (VOR) was established in Code in 2024 to address all-hazards resilience across the Commonwealth. The Office consists of three positions: Greg Steele, Chief Resilience Officer (CRO); Caitlin Verdu, Resilience Coordinator (RC); and Sigrid Lampe, Resilience Policy Advisor (RPA).

VOR’s established vision and mission are as follows:

Vision: A prepared Virginia that adapts to and thrives in an environment of evolving hazards to the benefit of all.
Mission: We prepare, support, and protect Virginians by ensuring an integrated partnership approach to address evolving hazards across the Commonwealth.

In short, VOR’s goal is to provide “safer homes, drier roads, and stronger communities” for all Virginians.

VOR is statutorily required by § 2.2-220.5 of the Virginia Code, to serve as the primary coordinator for resilience and adaptation initiatives across state agencies, develop a statewide resilience strategy, identify high-risk areas, support local governments with resilience planning, support disaster mitigation and recovery, and assist with implementing state resilience master plans, such as the Virginia Flood Protection Master Plan and the Virginia Coastal Master Plan. VOR promotes cooperation between state, federal, and local entities.

The mandate requires convening the Interagency Resilience Management Team (IRMT) quarterly. The purpose of the IRMT is to ensure a unified, cross-agency approach to resilience planning and implementation. This includes exchanging information and best practices, integrating common language and approaches for resilience work across agencies, advising the CRO on strategies to strengthen statewide coordination and funding for resilience initiatives, and recommending metrics to track progress toward resilience goals in the Commonwealth.

Working with the IRMT, VOR identified 73 hazards, which are organized into 13 categories.

These categories are:

Animal health
Changing environmental conditions/extreme meteorological events
Connectivity/communications
Economic
Energy
Flooding: coastal, riverine and pluvial
Food systems
Geologic
Human-induced threat
Infrastructure
Public health
Space weather
Water

Of these 73 hazards, VOR is most focused on four priority areas, including flooding, the water system (including water supply, treatment, and distribution), the energy grid, and public health.

Contact Us:

Greg Steele
Chief Resilience Officer
greg.steele@governor.virginia.gov

Caitlin Verdu
Resilience Coordinator
caitlin.verdu@governor.virginia.gov

Sigrid Lampe
Resilience Policy Advisory
sigrid.lampe@governor.virginia.gov