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:
- Increasing awareness of current climate and health related activities and successes across our community
- Fostering environmental actions for a healthier community
- Coordinating research and collaborative efforts to catalyze change
- Building community awareness through reasonable and unified climate change and health messages
- Promoting public education about climate and health
Workgroup partner agencies include: