What is a coastal hazard? Perceptions of critical coastal hazards amongst decision makers in communities across the Great Lakes

Coastal hazards are pervasive across the Great Lakes coastline due to highly variable water levels, community utilization of the landscape, and landscape composition. These coastlines are dotted with communities that depend on the lake for socioeconomic stability. Recently, many communities have been tasked with the development of new coastal management policies to combat the record water levels and its impacts to socioenvironmental conditions. Many of those tasked with the development of such policies don't, necessarily, have backgrounds in coastal processes. This lack of background knowledge may impact coastal management strategies. Through a workshop activity, in 6 communities, local decision makers were asked to interpret imagery depicting varying coastal hazards. Additionally, participants were asked to rank the hazard based on the impacts seen in the community. Using text mining and statistical analysis, patterns in their interpretation were chronicled. Overall, we found vastly different terminology, understanding, and hazard recognition across the communities. [Display omitted] •It is essential to foster a broad collaborative relationship between decision makers and the scientific community.•Across all communities there was great awareness of erosion effects and mitigation strategies.•Beyond erosion there was lesser understanding of coastal hazards and the mitigation strategies associated.