The consequences of climate change in the Sonoran Desert are impossible to ignore.
Especially outside.
About six years ago, I got rid of my car and put that theory to the test. For the next five years I walked just about everywhere in Phoenix. To work. To the store. To meetings. I walked in the morning and at night. In winter and summer.
I walked when temperatures climbed above 110. When sweat evaporates before it cools the skin. When concrete can give you third-degree burns.
I saw children at bus stops.
I saw men and women at construction sites.
I walked when overnight lows were in the 90s.
When relief never comes.
When downtown buildings still radiate triple digits.
I saw men and women with blankets sleeping on sidewalks.
I saw cooks in open air food trucks.
I published stories in The Republic when 100 people in Maricopa County had died of heat-related illnesses. And when 200 had died and 300 and 400 and 500 and 600.
Last summer, to chronicle this important story, The Arizona Republic sent 50 journalists into the field to cover extreme heat for seven straight days.
This incredible group of journalists returned with heartbreaking stories of suffering and surprising stories of resilience.
That’s why Arizona is the ideal place for The Society of Environmental Journalists to spend this week exploring the majestic and climate-challenged place we call home. We need a world of journalists to understand how 22 tribal nations, seven and a half million people, 10 national parks and monuments and the nation’s fifth-largest city coexist with limited water and unbridled heat.
On Friday and Saturday, the nation’s top climate reporters and scientists are discussing Arizona’s future, thanks in part to Dr. Michael Crow and Arizona State University, who helped bring SEJ’s annual conference to its Tempe campus.
Covering Arizona’s environment is one of the most important things we do at The Republic. This series examining the myths and modifications of Arizona’s Five C’s (climate, citrus, copper, cotton, cattle) is just one recent example. We’re able to pursue ambitious work on this scale thanks in part to grants from the Nina Mason Pulliam Charitable Trust and the Catena Foundation.
Never has reporting like this mattered more.
We’ve made hard choices as an industry, but my newsroom has never backed off an important story.
Just the opposite. When the stakes have risen, we’ve invested more time and energy.
For the past decade, I’ve led planning calls for a national team of climate reporters in the USA TODAY Network. These reporters work at The Republic and the Detroit Free Press and the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and the Desert Sun and the Indianapolis Star and the Palm Beach Post and the Eugene Register-Guard and in many other newsrooms large and small.
This team has done the opposite of backing away. They’ve written more stories than ever before about climate and the environment.
Last year, USA TODAY Network reporters published more than 10,000 stories about climate and the environment.
That topped the previous year’s record.
At The Republic, we’re committed to cultivating more of this work.
So, this year, we are running a student newsroom for SEJ’s annual conference. For three days, 16 students are covering panel discussions, speeches and tours of the state’s border, tribal lands, forests and infrastructure for water and energy. Helping to make it happen are our partners at ASU’s Cronkite School, SEJ, the University of Arizona and grants from the Pulliam Trust and the Arizona Media Association’s Local News Foundation.
Thanks to this collective effort, a cohort of emerging journalists are learning about and reporting about the story of our age. You can find their stories on azcentral.com and in AZ Climate, The Republic’s climate newsletter, and Climate Point, USA TODAY’s climate newsletter.
The people who live on the streets in Phoenix and Tempe need them. The industry needs them. We need them.
Greg Burton is executive editor of The Arizona Republic, azcentral.com and La Voz and western regional editor for the USA TODAY Network. He can be reached at greg.burton@azcentral.com or 602-444-8797.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Burton: Telling Arizona’s climate and environment story is vital
