Panel says cities need help addressing worsening heat
Statewide system planned to rank severity of heat waves and warn people
Climate change-driven extreme heat is here, it will get worse and California communities need to ramp up preparations as rising temperatures continue to threaten public health.
That was the message delivered during a recent panel discussion organized by Ethnic Media Services that was focused on the state's sweltering future and strategies to cope with it.
The media needs to do a better job of reporting on the reality of prolonged, extreme heat, said Braden Kay, extreme heat and community resilience program manager in the state Office of Planning and Research A lot of news stories tend to focus on dramatic temperature spikes in places like Death Valley and the Central Valley during the hottest days of the year, Kay said.
And many people, particularly those in warmer parts of the state, believe their communities have always just been hot.
“We're trying to explain to people these are not your grandmother's heat waves,” Kay said.
Global temperatures have been rising for decades and many parts of California — where the hottest season of the year was mostly confined to summer — are now seeing temperatures above 90 degrees in the early spring and lasting until late fall.
“And the fact is, a lot of heat illnesses and a lot of heat deaths happen any time that it's over 90 degrees in a lot of communities,” Kay said. “Extreme heat is the climate risk that all of our 58 counties will experience.”
Also, low-income communities and communities of color experience the worst public health outcomes because of extreme heat.
In response, the state is offering nearly $300 million to local and tribal governments and community nonprofits to help build “critical infrastructure” to address extreme heat, create urban heat island mitigation measures and develop climate change adaptation plans, among other things.
Kay said his office is also involved in the creation of a statewide warning system that is planned to be up and running in the next several years that will rank the severity of heat waves and warn people when they are coming.
Such a system could be a lifesaver for communities like those in the Imperial Valley, where av