Last year was the hottest year on record , and 2024 has a one-in-three chance of being even hotter. As temperatures increase and climate change worsens, extreme heat events will occur with more frequency and intensity, having an outsized impact in dense, urban areas. Urban neighborhoods face increased temperatures due to building concentrations and a lack of green space, creating a phenomenon referred to as the urban heat island effect. Neighborhoods with a high number of low-income residents of color experience more intense heat island effects. This is not by chance, but is a result of deliberate, discriminatory housing policies that have impacted people of color, pushing them into vulnerable neighborhoods prone to extreme heat exacerbated by climate change.

As climate change intensifies, severe flood events have become more commonplace across the entire U.S. Extreme flooding disproportionately impacts low-income communities and people of color because they often live in areas that are more prone to flooding, in housing stock not well suited to weather such events, and lack adequate disaster plans as well as the financial means to evacuate and/or temporarily relocate.