Planning for Resilient Shores: A Workshop Recap

Healthy shorelines don't protect themselves. They need champions at every level, from lakeshore homeowners to township supervisors to municipal planners. That's the idea behind the Planning for Resilient Shores Workshop, a peer learning opportunity hosted in partnership with the Michigan Association of Planning that brought decision-makers and community leaders together to do exactly that.

The workshop brought together a diverse group of participants — planning commission members, township supervisors, local property owners, conservation partners, and staff from Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe, all united by a shared interest in protecting the lakes and shorelines they call home.

Using Tawas Lake as a real-world case study, presenters explored how communities can proactively protect beloved local water resources before problems arise. The session focused on practical, actionable tools: how to assess and evolve zoning and ordinance language to better protect water quality and shoreline health, and how to translate community values into master plan language that can actually be implemented. The through line was straightforward — when a community identifies and documents what it cares about, that shared vision becomes the foundation for lasting protection.

This workshop served as a companion program to one hosted earlier in the year in partnership with the Michigan Shoreline Partnership, which brought together shoreline property owners around Tawas Lake and other lakes in the region. That program focused on connecting property owners to the tools and resources available to them to create and steward healthy, natural shorelines ensuring that both landowners and local decision-makers are part of the same broader effort.

"What stood out at this workshop was the range of people in the room — planners, tribal representatives, property owners and elected officials all working toward the same goal,” said Leah DuMouchel from Michigan Association of Planning. “That kind of cross-sector collaboration is exactly what resilient shoreline planning requires."

For Lake Huron Forever, this workshop reflects a growing priority: connecting peer learning opportunities directly to the people who hold decision-making power at the local level. Zoning and ordinance language may not sound like the most exciting topic, but it is one of the most powerful tools a community has to protect the places it loves. We're excited to keep offering these learning opportunities across Northern Michigan and look forward to more conversations like this one.

Funding for this program was made possible with support from the Iosco County Community Improvement Fund and the Iosco County Lakes and Rivers Fund held at the Iosco County Community Foundation.