{"id":58992,"date":"2023-07-24T13:23:31","date_gmt":"2023-07-24T20:23:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/?p=58992"},"modified":"2023-07-24T13:23:31","modified_gmt":"2023-07-24T20:23:31","slug":"how-the-west-coasts-only-heat-officer-is-cooling-la","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/?p=58992","title":{"rendered":"How the West Coast\u2019s Only Heat Officer is Cooling LA"},"content":{"rendered":"
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By<\/span>Selen Ozturk<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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LA Chief Heat Officer Marta Segura is responding to the heat waves scorching Southern California as a public health crisis.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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LOS ANGELES \u2014 As triple-digit summer temperatures sweep Southern California, Marta Segura is treating extreme heat as a public health crisis.<\/p>\n

Segura, LA\u2019s Climate Emergency Mobilization Director, also became its first Chief Heat Officer (CHO) in June 2022. As the region has seen record July heat with little relief, she has prioritized accessibility to cooling resources, particularly for underserved LA communities.<\/p>\n

Extreme heat, the country\u2019s top weather-related killer, is generally defined as at least two to three days of high heat and humidity with temperatures above 90 degrees Fahrenheit. On an extreme heat day, there\u2019s an average of\u00a08,222 more<\/a>\u00a0emergency room visits across California for related issues. Of these, 1,510 are in LA County alone.\u00a0An estimated<\/a>\u00a016 additional people there die on the first day of extreme heat, with 40 more deaths a day by the fifth.<\/p>\n

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Marta Segura is LA\u2019s Climate Emergency Mobilization Director and the city\u2019s first Chief Heat Officer (CHO).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

These hospitalizations and deaths disproportionately affect communities of color living in low-income, historically redlined neighborhoods, said Segura, \u201cwhere the houses don\u2019t have AC or air filtration. When you start approaching heat vulnerability that way, it\u2019s not only a sustainability issue \u2014 it\u2019s public works, building development, water and power, tree shade and park access, and certainly a matter of public health.\u201d<\/p>\n

Heat is the top public health risk in LA, which experiences heat waves five times more often than it did 10 years ago. As extreme heat waves in Los Angeles become\u00a0longer, more frequent and more intense<\/a>, public outreach becomes ever-more crucial. Across her\u00a0Heat Relief 4 LA<\/a>\u00a0social media campaign, Segura emphasizes that \u201cIt\u2019s not your typical summer anymore. Extreme heat can run from June to November. As this means our bodies have less time to recover, we also distribute information on symptoms of heat exhaustion and heatstroke, and resources to cool off before hitting that point.\u201d<\/p>\n

Foremost among these resources are cooling centers; in Los Angeles,\u00a0currently<\/a>\u00a0119 are open. \u201cWe\u2019ve established cooling centers and hydration resources throughout the city in facilities like libraries, senior centers and community centers,\u201d said Segura. \u201cWe also made an app,\u00a0Cool Spots LA<\/a>, where you can find where and when they\u2019re open, alongside other cooling spots like shade structures, hydration stations, and bus shelters.\u201d Currently, only\u00a0a quarter<\/a>\u00a0of all LA Metro bus stops are shaded.<\/p>\n

The need for heat interventions like these can vary drastically from neighborhood to neighborhood, partly because of the region\u2019s coastal and inland microclimates. Accordingly, the city\u2019s\u00a0emergency alert system<\/a>\u00a0now uses National Weather Service data to identify heat wave severity in specific parts of LA.<\/p>\n

However, these stark regional heat differences also owe to shade inequity.\u00a0Research shows<\/a>\u00a0that with each 10% of canopy cover, trees keep ground-level temperatures about 2 degrees cooler. In a city where\u00a0over half<\/a>\u00a0the surfaces are dark concrete or asphalt \u2014 which absorbs up to 90% of solar radiation \u2014\u00a020%<\/a>\u00a0of tree canopies are concentrated in four neighborhoods where less than 1% of the population live.<\/p>\n

To address this inequity, 65,000 trees have been planted citywide in continuation of a\u00a02019 plan<\/a>\u00a0by former Mayor Eric Garcetti to increase canopy coverage 50% by 2028 across LA\u2019s least green neighborhoods. The aim is 90,000 trees by 2028.<\/p>\n

Environmental inequity is a testament to why extreme heat is a public health issue, said Segura. \u201cLA\u2019s least green areas are historically disadvantaged neighborhoods where we not only see more heat-related illnesses but also more pollution and exacerbated chronic illnesses like asthma.\u201d Hence,\u00a0life expectancy<\/a>\u00a0in wealthy areas with ample green space like Beverly Hills is as high as 90, while that in disadvantaged south LA neighborhoods less than 15 miles away is as low as 77.<\/p>\n

Thus, she continued, when heat policies \u201ccoordinate with departments across the city, the county, and\u201d \u2014 under Gov. Gavin Newsom\u2019s historic $800 million\u00a0Extreme Heat Action Plan<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 \u201cthe state, the result can be life-saving.\u201d Nevertheless, CHOs remain rare. Segura is joined by only two in the nation \u2014 in Phoenix, Arizona and Miami, Florida \u2014 and seven worldwide.<\/p>\n

However, she continued, it\u2019s becoming a matter of course for cities to develop not only general climate plans, but also heat action plans. These are largely a matter of \u201cshort-term planning for public engagement and emergency response, and long-term planning for public health and\u00a0resilient infrastructure<\/a>,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

The heart of her work as LA\u2019s CHO, Segura said, is aligning climate equity gaps with public health results: \u201cto treat one is to improve the other. We can see the results all over the world\u00a0 \u2014 if we have no plan, it\u2019s only going to get hotter and hotter.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BySelen Ozturk Jul 24, 2023 LA...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-58992","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ca-local"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58992","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=58992"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58992\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":58993,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58992\/revisions\/58993"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=58992"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=58992"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=58992"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}