A State Press article detailed how the Healthy Urban Environments Initiative partners are working with Phoenix city officials to reduce temperatures across the Valley after a record-breaking summer.

Reducing temperatures for low-income communities and other efforts to make Phoenix a "HeatReady" city were among the topics discussed at the latest Urban Heat Island/Tree and Shade subcommittee meeting. "The closing of cooling areas was a move that largely affects the most vulnerable people who can't afford air conditioning, according to Charles Redman, a professor at the School of Human Evolution and Social Change, who said that heat is a 'real public threat.'"

Read more in the article, "Transforming Phoenix into an 'urban forest' to combat extreme heat."