ORLANDO, Fla. — Florida is the hottest state in the continental U.S., and its residents suffer the most from heatstroke. Seniors are the most vulnerable to the effects of the heat, with about 4.7 million Floridians, or one in five residents, being 65 or older.
The peninsula has 8,436 miles of coastline, and three-quarters of the state's residents live in coastal counties at risk of rising sea levels, extreme rainfall, and more intense hurricanes.
Climate change is making Florida hotter and increasing the risk of flooding and severe storms, and the state should expect increasingly “adverse public health impacts, including heatstroke and mortality, especially among vulnerable populations,” according to the Florida State University Office of the State Climatologist.
But Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis has opposed many efforts to address the causes and public health impacts of climate change, forcing Florida cities, counties and nonprofits to take a larger role in addressing rising temperatures, but many say they lack sufficient funding and resources.
Perhaps more than any other state, Florida illustrates how the politicization of climate change has hindered action on it.
Unlike other states, Florida doesn't have a statewide plan designed specifically to help residents deal with extreme heat and other impacts from climate change. Dr. Cheryl Holder, co-chair of Miami-Dade County's Climate and Heat Health Task Force, said that in the absence of state leadership, Florida cities and counties have been doing the best they can. For example, Miami-Dade County appointed its first-ever chief heat officer in 2021, and last month Tampa released a “heat resilience playbook” that includes steps such as strengthening and protecting the city's tree canopy.
In the face of natural disasters, more lawmakers are trying to force oil companies to pay damages.
But Holder said a statewide effort similar to a public health campaign to curb smoking would have a much bigger impact.
“Systemic change would be better, but we're left with a piecemeal approach,” Holder told Stateline.
Christy Aebi, a professor at the University of Washington and an epidemiologist and expert on health risks from climate change, said state public health leadership is essential in Florida and across the country.
“Local health departments follow the direction of the state health department and it's hard for them to go against that,” Ebi said. “When the state health department says, 'Here's the approach, here's the perspective, here's the standards,' it's hard for local health departments to do anything differently.”
DeSantis' office, the Florida Department of Health and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection did not respond to Stateline's requests for comment before publication.
It's been a bipartisan concern in the past.
Climate change was an issue for both parties in Florida as recently as 2008. But DeSantis, who lost his bid for the Republican presidential nomination this year, embodies the party's current disregard for climate change, a stance shared by his predecessor as governor, current U.S. Senator Rick Scott.
For example, Governor DeSantis signed a bill in May that removed references to climate change from the state's energy policy and exempted state agencies from having to consider climate change when implementing policy. “We are returning sanity to our approach to energy and rejecting the radical environmentalist agenda,” Governor DeSantis said. I wrote to X.
Governor DeSantis signed a law in April that bars Florida cities and counties from enacting their own heat policies, such as mandatory water breaks for outdoor workers, forcing Miami-Dade County to withdraw pending rules that would have required water breaks for outdoor workers and required employers to provide heatstroke training.
We are ready to cooperate if the State Government determines that it requires further information in this regard.
– Chris Uezio of Florida State University is leading a project with local health agencies on health risks from climate change.
Texas' Republican governor, Greg Abbott, signed a similar law last year banning cities from enacting heat break ordinances.
Meanwhile, many other states are moving in the opposite direction.
States including Arizona, California, Connecticut, New York, North Carolina and Wisconsin have used federal funding from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to develop statewide plans to address the public health impacts of climate change. All of these states have Democratic governors.
In April, the Democratic-led state of New Jersey released a draft heat-resistance action plan that included a number of measures, including setting up public cooling centers, planting more trees and adopting workplace safety rules.
California has launched a statewide public information campaign to raise awareness of the risks of extreme heat, especially among vulnerable populations such as seniors and the homeless, and New Jersey is set to launch one as well.
Florida State University also received a grant from the CDC, but the team is focused on working with local health departments, said project leader Chris Uezio, a medical geographer and associate professor at the university.
“We are always ready to cooperate if the state determines it needs more information in this regard,” Uezio said.
“Falling behind the pack”
Despite downplaying concerns about climate change, Governor DeSantis approved $640 million in new state spending in 2021 to help communities deal with rising seas, intensifying storms and flooding, and appointed the state's first chief resilience officer in 2019.
But DeSantis' interest in these efforts faded as the presidential campaign got underway. Florida was one of five states (the other four were Iowa, Kentucky, South Dakota and Wyoming) that declined to apply for federal climate pollution reduction grants under President Joe Biden's Inflation Control Act. The federal government allowed large metropolitan areas to apply for their own climate planning grants. Five Florida regions applied for their own grants and received money for their plans but not for implementation.
A year ago, DeSantis rejected about $350 million in federal energy efficiency incentives and consumer rebates under the Inflation Control Act, but this year, after dropping out of the primary, he accepted the money.
Cold states now have to contend with extreme heat caused by climate change
Susan Glickman, vice president of policy and partnerships at the CLEO Institute, a Florida-based nonprofit focused on climate education and advocacy, praised Florida for addressing sea level rise and assessing the vulnerability of coastal communities, but she said the state must address the root causes and cascading effects of climate change.
“We have to adapt to a warming world, but the current decisions that don't address the root causes of the problem are really unacceptable,” Glickman said. “We can't get out of climate change by adapting alone.”
Kim Ross, executive director of Rethink Energy Florida, a Tallahassee-based nonprofit that promotes clean energy, said the DeSantis administration is creating an obstacle.
“This could be a state that's really focused on the inventions we need,” Ross said, “but we're just lagging behind other states.”
Ross said whenever he finds an opportunity for a federal climate change grant, he first questions whether it's possible to get the grant without state assistance.
“I'm thinking, 'Are there out-of-state options?' And I continue to encourage anyone I can speak to at the federal level that there are out-of-state options,” she said.
