Bridging Climate Change and Health Workgroup

Starting in 2016, Maricopa County hosted several “Bridging Climate Change and Public Health” meetings which convened representatives from a diverse array of local community organizations, private businesses, government agencies, and academic institutions. Facilitated discussion helped identify local activities in the fields of climate and health, as well as stakeholders’ perceived needs of the community and barriers to successful collaboration.

A subset of meeting participants formed the Bridging Climate Change and Public Health Strategic Planning Workgroup, which developed five priority actions for addressing environmental concerns affecting the health and well-being of the community:

  1. Increasing awareness of current climate and health related activities and successes across our community
  2. Fostering environmental actions for a healthier community 
  3. Coordinating research and collaborative efforts to catalyze change
  4. Building community awareness through reasonable and unified climate change and health messages
  5. Promoting public education about climate and health

Workgroup partner agencies include:

Arizona Asthma Coalition

Arizona Department of Health Services

Arizona Department of Water Resources

Arizona Public Health Association

Arizona State University

Chicanos Por La Causa

Citizens’ Climate Lobby

City of Phoenix, Heat Relief Network

Foundation for Senior Living

Health Care Without Harm

Institute for Sustainable Communities

Maricopa County Air Quality Department

Maricopa County Department of Public Health

Sierra Club

The Nature Conservancy

Trees Matter

University of Arizona

Virginia G. Piper Charitable Trust

ACTION TEAMS

Action teams with annual goals have been established for each strategic priority. Actions teams are led by team leads as well as members. Meetings are held monthly. We are always looking for members to join. For more information, please contact us at climateandhealth@maricopa.gov.

REPORTS