Lessons learned from supporting local planning for extreme heat in North Carolina.

The impacts of extreme heat are broad and systemic, affecting not only human health and well-being, but also infrastructure, energy systems, and public services. Many of the best strategies to address these impacts are implemented at the local level, by local governments and their partners. This paper covers the approaches taken by the North Carolina State Resilience Office (SRO), the North Carolina State Climate Office (SCO) and their partners to support the development of heat action plans by local governments in their state. These agencies collaborated to develop planning support resources and a programme to guide local governments through the process of developing heat action plans. The paper examines the rationale for this approach, the composition of the resources developed, the details of the planning programme, the results of this work, and how these agencies are adapting their programmes based on what they learned. This article is also included in The Business & Management Collection which can be accessed at https://hstalks.com/business/.