In October 2019, PG&E cut electricity to 500,000 customers as a precaution against sparking wildfires in high-wind conditions in California. When the City of Berkeley was faced with these outages, its residents asked what the city was going to do for people with disabilities. Unfortunately, the city had no plan for its residents and stated that people should use their own resources to relocate and access electricity. This is simply unacceptable.

Tempe should learn from this failure. Creating Resilience Hubs is one strategy Tempe should implement to prepare for such situations.

Community resilience is “the ability to anticipate, accommodate and positively adapt to or thrive amidst changing climate conditions, while enhancing quality of life, reliable systems, economic vitality, and conservation of resources.”

“Resilience Hubs are community-serving facilities augmented to 1) support residents and 2) coordinate resource distribution and services before, during, or after a natural hazard event.” A Resilience Hub is created by enhancing an existing community center. A Resilience Hub should 1) have community desire and support, 2) be an existing well-used and well-trusted building, 3) have the resources to meet community needs during extreme events, 4) have a cost-effective energy system to provide power during an extended outage, and 5) have community uses outside of resource distribution. In creating Resilience Hubs, Tempe can prioritize solutions that mitigate the harmful effects of climate change like switching to renewable energy and battery storage to meet backup power needs while reducing greenhouse gases.

Tempe can partner with the community organizations that utilize our community centers to enhance these existing buildings and create disaster response plans to better support our residents during emergencies. These existing accessible, ADA-compliant buildings are enjoyed by residents year round for youth, adult, and senior programs and easily transform into disaster response resource distribution centers during emergencies. Tempe can take advantage of our abundant solar resources by installing PV panels and battery storage on our existing community centers, thus providing residents with crucial electricity during emergencies and greenhouse gas reduction year round. This can look like enhancing our library and community centers with power systems, emergency food and water supplies, and cots to prepare for disasters. Resilience Hubs would be designed in partnership with community organizations and many of the City’s departments including, but not limited to, emergency management, health, sustainability, and public works.

Tempe must be able to persevere in the face of disaster. Resilience Hubs present an opportunity to further Tempe’s resilience, reduce carbon emissions, and improve equity. Tempe should create Resilience Hubs as an equitable way to improve resilience and sustainability.

-Casey Clowes