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I am an urban planner and an assistant professor in the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences at Stony Brook University, where I also teach in the Sustainability Studies program and direct the undergraduate major in Environmental Design, Policy and Planning. 

My research seeks to better understand the ways that cities can develop in more sustainable, equitable and resilient ways in the face of looming climate change risks. This work touches on a
variety of topics including resilient redevelopment of existing communities, long-term disaster recovery, environmental justice, coastal relocation, and the use of climate science in the urban
planning and policymaking process. I am also very interested in placemaking and urban design, especially how it intersects with my other interests.

Current research on these topics includes the US Department of Energy (DOE) funded Hyperfacets project, and new projects funded by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine and Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Region 8.

I have been an Early Career Faculty Innovator at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, CO, and am also affiliated with the Science and Resilience Institute at Jamaica Bay in New York City. I am an associate editor for social science with the journal Urban Climate. You can contact me at donovanfinn@outlook.com.

Some of my most recent publications include an article in Planning Magazine about the inequitable legacy of Hurricane Sandy recovery, an issue of the American Planning Association Zoning Practice newsletter on the topic of disaster recovery, and two recent essays about the value of interdisciplinary research in Environmental Research Letters and The Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society.