Amid extreme heat, climate group alerts Macon to perils of dangerous weather

A national tour to call attention to the dangers of extreme heat had to deal with sweltering temperatures in Macon Thursday.

The Climate Action Campaign partnered with Keep Macon-Bibb Beautiful and the Tubman Museum to hold the event on the museum’s front lawn, which featured several speakers and a symphony of paper fans in the background as attendees tried to beat the heat. Local leaders and concerned community members spoke out about how extreme heat and climate protection rollbacks harm Macon residents.

“Today should be the coolest weather we’ve had all week long,” George Crawley, the education coordinator at the Tubman Museum, said.

Following the Environmental Protection Agency announcement on Tuesday that it would rescind the 2009 Endangerment Finding, which stated that greenhouse gases that led to climate warming posed a threat to the public’s health, this event was critical to show that climate change is happening, said Satchel Tsai, a program manager for the CAC.

“This is a public health emergency that we cannot fail to address, as our health and well-being are dependent on it,” Anita Barkin, a certified nurse practitioner on the panel, said regarding the recent EPA announcement.

The CAC has been traveling across America visiting communities that suffer the most in extreme weather, and aims to bring together community leaders to share their stories and advocate for change. Tsai said that Macon made the list because of the severity of extreme heat, but also because of the disparity in how it is experienced throughout the community.

“Macon is one of the most redlined cities in America and so there’s one of the highest disparities in how extreme heat is experienced across different neighborhoods,” Tsai said. “The predominantly Black neighborhoods in Macon experience far more extreme heat, have far less tree cover and canopy cover, and so that’s why this issue is especially important here.”

Trees, Macon Bibb-Beautiful Executive Director Asha Ellen explained, are proven to reduce heat, take in storm water when it rains, and improve air quality. The lack of trees and canopy cover in marginalized communities causes an increased heat disparity throughout the community.

Community advocate raises her voice

For Tia Lockhart, a community advocate and resident of the Pleasant Hill neighborhood, she has not one, but two lives to think about as she shares her sweltering summer heat experience as a pregnant woman. Unable to walk in her own neighborhood park because of lack of tree cover and shade, she has to drive to a different park in order to get her daily exercise in.

“I know that this is important to do for the health of both myself and my baby, that I shouldn’t have to find these other options when I should be able to cross the street and get it done, “ Lockhart said.

She is concerned about the elderly, but also the kids in her community who she would normally urge to be active.

“This is a life and death situation that makes it more than just discomfort. This heat disparity is especially harmful in low income and Black communities, where redlining and disinvestment have left neighborhoods with little green infrastructure,” Lockhart said.

Pleasant Hill is a historically marginalized neighborhood affected by redlining. Pleasant Hill residents face challenges of being located in a food desert, and also poverty and policy issues in addition to their increased risk of heat illness. Lockhart has been advocating for environmental justice for years and advocates for more investment into green infrastructure.

Her goal is to educate the community as best she can on these issues, and make change that is long term and goes beyond putting a “band-aid” on surface-level issues, Lockhart said.

When asked if she could tell a difference in heat compared to last summer, Lockhart said yes.

“Yes, I absolutely feel it,” Lockhart said as she frantically waved her fan in front of her face to cool off.

Health professional dives into the risks of extreme heat

Barkin has been a public health professional in Macon for 40 years. Speaking about the dangers of heat exhaustion in four minutes proved to be a challenge, Barkin said.

While the extent of extreme heat affects everyone (and worsens with age), she raises these questions:

• Do you take medications that worsen your ability to withstand climate change?
• Do you not have access to air conditioning? 
• Do you live in a neighborhood where heat is worsened by concrete, asphalt and lack of trees? 
• Do you live near major highways where air pollution from vehicles worsens air quality? 
• Do you work outside, doing lawn work, farming, repairing groups, repairing highways?

A yes to any of these questions raises the risk of being affected by extreme heat. Dehydration in the face of extreme heat can cause heat exhaustion, seizures, heat stroke, and in the most extreme of cases, death, according to Barkin.

She is concerned about what the extreme heat could mean for some of her patients.

“I would talk to them about increasing exercise. Now I have to say, don’t go out in extreme heat, and you have to look at the Air Quality Index, because if the air quality is really bad. I don’t want you out walking,” Barkin said.

A commissioner shares his voice

Community leaders and citizens on the panel used the event as a call to action. They urged community members to hold leaders accountable and fight for environmental justice in the face of the Trump administration’s climate protection roll backs, but also urged citizens to stay out of the sun and stay hydrated during periods of extreme heat. Commissioner Stanley Stewart issued his call to action because he could see firsthand how Maconites are suffering from the heat.

“We need more actual action at the local level from individuals like myself and like the administration and the other Commissioners to make sure we keep this issue on the forefront,” Stewart said.

As a Commissioner, he pledged to work on getting more cooling spots in Macon as the heat continues to increase. When the weather drops in the winter, he said warming stations would be needed. Climate change is an ongoing issue, Stewart said.