Case study of
#00008 Passive-cooling urban design plus formal heat governance
Miami-Dade County, Florida, USA
#00059
Implementer
Miami-Dade County, with the Atlantic Council Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center (Extreme Heat Resilience Alliance)
Timeline
Since May 1, 2021
Location
Description
In 2021 Miami-Dade County appointed Jane Gilbert as the world's first Chief Heat Officer — a dedicated municipal post to coordinate extreme-heat response across agencies that otherwise treat heat as no one's specific responsibility. The role was seeded by the Atlantic Council's Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center (Arsht-Rock) and its Extreme Heat Resilience Alliance, which subsequently supported rollout in Athens (Eleni Myrivili) and Freetown (Eugenia Kargbo, Africa's first). The role creates a named budget line and accountable owner for heat interventions across city departments.
Metrics
1Funding
Lessons learned
- Naming a single accountable officer addresses the 'silent hazard' gap where heat is everyone's problem and therefore no one's responsibility.
- The role is inexpensive relative to capital cooling projects and raises the return on every other intervention by making heat visible in governance.
- Networked rollout via Arsht-Rock let cities adopt a ready-made roadmap rather than each starting from scratch — Athens and Freetown followed Miami within months.
Documented Jun 9, 2026