After a deadly heat wave last summer, the Phoenix metro area is changing tactics

PHOENIX — Afraid of being attacked in a shelter, Pearl Marion couch surfed with family and friends during last year’s sweltering summer so she wouldn’t have to sleep outdoors.

This year, the 65-year-old plans to spend Phoenix’s dangerously hot summer nights in a former cafeteria outside the city’s main library, sleeping in a chair, with her head resting on a table. There’s fresh air, cold water, and security guards to stop anyone from stealing your bus pass.

“I love this place,” Marion said in the space where half a dozen other people napped and charged their phones. Newcomers were asked if they needed help with housing, substance abuse or air conditioning repairs.

It’s one of two nightlife venues that opened in early May after Maricopa County saw a staggering 645 heat-related deaths last year, about 50% more than the 425 confirmed for 2022.

Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs declared a state of emergency in 2023 after the Phoenix metro area experienced a 31-day streak of temperatures reaching at least 110 degrees Fahrenheit (43.3 degrees Celsius). The high in Phoenix has already reached 100 F (37.7 C) several times this year.

“People need cooling centers to be open longer and on weekends,” said Dr. Rebecca Sunenshine, medical director for the Maricopa County Department of Public Health. “The other important piece we learned is that people need help finding cooling centers and other heat relief resources. ”

The record deaths came as Maricopa County led the United States in growth amid a housing crisis that has resulted in rising rents and a rise in evictions. As the homeless population rose last year to more than 9,600 countywide, climate change increased temperatures.

Maricopa County’s first heat-related death of 2023 was recorded on April 11, when 42-year-old Crystal Gradilla was found in a tent in a desert area when the temperature reached 99 F (37.2 C).

In mid-summer 2023, the county medical examiner’s office reported that body storage was nearly full and placed 10 refrigerated trucks on hold. While the extra storage wasn’t necessary, it was clear that more needed to be done, especially to protect the homeless who are responsible for 45% of deaths in Arizona’s most populous county.

This year, no heat-related deaths have been reported in Maricopa County from 2024 through April.

This year, authorities in Phoenix, Maricopa County and Arizona are working to better protect people.

Arizona has a new heat officer – Dr. Eugene Livar, the first position of its kind in the U.S. – to execute the governor’s extreme heat preparedness plan. Phoenix named the nation’s first municipal heating officer in 2021.

At least two cooling spaces in the Phoenix metro area will be open overnight, and others will have extended hours, including on some weekend days.

A call center staffed by 30 bilingual community health workers is tasked with helping people find centers, pay electricity bills and repair home refrigeration units.

In recent years, the 170 cooling centers spread across metro Phoenix from May through October typically closed when the workday ended at 5 p.m., as high temperatures hit.

Arizona has mobile solar-powered units made from shipping containers to be transported wherever needed.

Officials and health professionals hope fewer homeless people will die this summer after a court order forced the city to clear a downtown Phoenix encampment known as “The Zone” where up to 1,200 people crowded together under the scorching sun.

Hundreds went to shelters or found housing. About 150 people moved with their tents to a structured camp nearby, on land acquired by the city.

People who stay there are searched by security guards for drugs, alcohol and weapons. There are bathrooms, showers and an air-conditioned warehouse where up to 200 people can have meals and escape the heat.

Hundreds of more shelter beds have been gradually added across metro Phoenix in recent years. A main campus in the city center houses shelters with more than 900 beds. St. Vincent de Paul is completing a 100-bed long-term shelter nearby for seniors, military veterans and people with disabilities, which will open this summer.

Maricopa County’s annual homeless count in January showed a slightly lower population than the previous year, with well over half sleeping in shelters.

Although Phoenix is ​​known for its heat, some Arizona communities get even hotter.

The state’s high of 128 F (53.3 C) was recorded on June 29, 1994, in Lake Havasu City. In southwest Yuma County, Dario Mendoza, a 26-year-old farmworker, died on July 20 after collapsing in a field as highs reached 116 F (46.6 C).

Last year in Pima County, home to Arizona’s second-most populous city, Tucson, there were 176 heat-related deaths and another 51 deaths in the five additional rural counties the medical examiner oversees.

Greg Hess, Pima County’s chief medical examiner, said his office can better track and categorize heat-related deaths after hiring an epidemiologist and adding a new online dashboard.

Hess said tracking and publicizing heat-related deaths can spark change, just as tracking fatal overdoses launched the fight against the opioid crisis.

“The investigation of heat-related deaths has to be intentional,” he said.