Urban Heat Island Reduction Plan: CivicSpark Case Study

 

Catherine Baltazar, 2016-17 CivicSpark Fellow

Los Angeles County Department of Public Health

Summary

The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health is responsible for the health and well-being of the 10 million residents of Los Angeles County. When approaching climate change mitigation and adaptation, the size and scope of the county and its complex demographics, microclimates, and jurisdictional structure make for many challenges and opportunities.

The Los Angeles County Climate Committee first convened in fall 2014 as a subcommittee of the County’s Healthy Design Workgroup (HDW). The HDW has been operating since 2012 as an interdepartmental effort to promote planning, designing, and building healthy, livable communities. LA County’s Climate Committee and HDW are led by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, with members from other County Departments. The Climate Committee’s purpose is to tackle climate change mitigation and adaptation issues, since these cannot be undertaken by one department alone. The Committee chose urban heat island reduction as its first major project, recognizing that the many and varied strategies needed to cool neighborhoods benefit greatly from the coordination and collaboration of several County departments. Urban heat island reduction also fulfills goals laid out in the County’s Unincorporated Community Climate Action Plan for 2020.

The Committee employed a consensus-oriented decision-making process and continual feedback from its member departments to craft a suite of strategies aimed at reducing the urban heat island effect. The result aims to be an action-oriented, practical plan that provides a blueprint for how County departments can work together to reduce Los Angeles County’s urban heat island effect. The Urban Heat Island Reduction Plan (Plan) outlines four strategies for addressing the urban heat island: Cool Roofs, Trees, Green Space, and Cool and Permeable Pavements. Each strategy features an implementation plan, with Action Items broken down into programs and projects, research and funding, policies, and incentives. Simultaneously, the Committee developed an outreach strategy to gain feedback and buy-in for the Plan from key stakeholders.

Lead Agency and Partnerships

Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, in coordination with other County Departments.

Drivers

Urban Heat Island effect concerns in LA; efforts of HDW; fulfilling goals of County’s Community Climate Action Plan.

Engagement Process

Certain populations are particularly vulnerable to adverse health outcomes related to extreme heat—due to physiological sensitivity, greater exposure, or limited ability to adapt to the effects of extreme heat. The elderly, young children, and people with pre-existing medical conditions are more physiologically susceptible to the effects of extreme heat. Outdoor workers, athletes, and the homeless are more exposed to extreme heat. People without air conditioning, low-income populations, and those without cars are less able to adapt to extreme heat because they have fewer options for reaching air conditioned spaces.

The growing risk of longer and more frequent extreme events creates a disproportionate burden on low-income urban populations, who are more likely to live in neighborhoods with less tree canopy and older buildings that lack air conditioning (Vanos et al., 2014). However, even for those not especially vulnerable to heat, extreme heat affects overall quality of life for everyone. Increased air pollution, reduced nighttime cooling, and increased temperatures can create greater discomfort and danger to human health for all.  

As a way of ensuring the proposed actions from the Plan do not generate additional burdens, either directly or indirectly, to communities of color, low income communities, and communities with vulnerable populations, LA County has reached out to local and state organizations who work with local communities to advocate for healthy neighborhoods, equitable standards in public health intervention efforts, and diverse, local environmental policies. LA County firmly believes stakeholder feedback is essential to the development of the Plan, as it is through partnerships with these organizations, that we can truly inspire social change, engage and connect disadvantaged communities, and promote and achieve equity within local governments. Conversations with stakeholders have resulted in language changes to the Plan, as well as the inclusion of specific community-requested actions, such as the preference for smaller, more centralized community spaces versus larger, more venue-like parks in dense neighborhoods.

Climate Impact Area

Increasing temperatures—both higher average annual temperatures and more days of extreme heat—are expected to be among the major impacts of climate change in the Los Angeles region. These projections have far-reaching implications for public health, because extreme heat leads to more deaths in the United States each year than floods, storms, and lightning combined. More frequent and severe extreme heat events can be expected to contribute to increased morbidity and mortality, higher healthcare costs, stress to energy infrastructure, and negative impacts on overall health and well-being.

Challenges

The main challenge facing the project is staff resources. Public Health has one full-time staff person dedicated to climate change, and additionally utilized a CivicSpark fellow to assist with running the Climate Committee, conducting literature searches to inform sections of the plan, and writing the Plan. However, resources for conducting external engagement to gain feedback on and support for the Plan, and resources to finalize the Plan, are limited. Insufficient resources to implement well-defined solutions to address climate change are a common barrier across government agencies, and particularly health departments.

Outcomes / Paths to Success + Replicability

Various strategies have allowed for the success of the Climate Committee, including:

Forming a workgroup focused on collaboration

Many Los Angeles County departments are actively involved in climate change work. Establishing the Climate Committee provided a venue for interdepartmental communication and collaboration, increasing each departments’ awareness of the others’ activities and allowing the development of important synergies.

Identifying potential projects based on established County priorities

Projects were selected using a consensus-oriented decision-making process, which promotes members’ involvement in and ownership over the decisions made by the workgroup. Potential projects were assessed based on an agreed-upon list of criteria, one of the most important of which was whether the project helps implement adopted or draft County plan. Urban heat island reduction projects are pursuant to the objectives laid out in the Countys Unincorporated Community Climate Action Plan.

Learning from successes and challenges faced by pioneers in the field

The City of Los Angeles has already passed a cool roofs ordinance, setting an important precedent that other jurisdictions can follow. The County has been fortunate to be able to draw on the experience and expertise of staff at the City of Los Angeles as well as Climate Resolve, who were instrumental in developing and implementing the ordinance. 

Recommendations to State Programs and Partners from project team

Local agencies working on urban heat island reduction measures would benefit from the following actions from State programs and partners:

Adopt official standards and other guidance regarding cool and permeable pavements

Local jurisdictions would benefit from State guidance on the required characteristics of cool and permeable pavements, as a model for developing their own policies and programs related to pavements.

Provide more opportunities for technical training and assistance

Cool roofs and cool and permeable pavements are a new area of expertise, often unfamiliar to staff. The provision of training and direct technical assistance on these topics would help build local capacity to adopt appropriate policies and programs related to cool surfaces.

 

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