KVIG Informative

Southern Nevada is in the middle of another dangerous heat wave. A new study finds that half the people surveyed didn’t even know the region’s cooling stations were there to help.

The Desert Research Institute’s Nevada Heat Lab released a report this week examining how effectively Clark County’s network of cooling stations reaches the people who need them. In a survey of 489 people, about half said they did not know the sites existed, according to the nonprofit research institute.

The stations themselves aren’t new emergency shelters — they’re mostly libraries and community centers that already operate as part of people’s daily routines, according to David Almanza, the postdoctoral researcher who authored the report. Almanza said these buildings provide cooling-station services whether or not people recognize them that way.

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The findings arrive as a high-pressure system pushes daily highs into the 110s across Southern Nevada this week, with little to no overnight relief, according to the National Weather Service’s most recent forecast discussion. Las Vegas hit 114 degrees Friday, the hottest day recorded in the region so far this year, according to the National Weather Service.

The stakes are not abstract. Southern Nevada recorded 527 heat-related deaths in 2024, its deadliest summer on record, according to the Clark County coroner’s office. Las Vegas and Reno rank as the two fastest-warming cities in the country when measured against 1970 temperature data.

The Nevada Heat Lab’s report recommends treating cooling stations as active public health infrastructure rather than passive amenities — meaning better signage, clearer public messaging, and coordination with the agencies that already run these buildings for other purposes.

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The lab, created in 2023 and originally focused on Southern Nevada before expanding statewide this year, has become something close to an unofficial emergency response team for extreme heat, briefing municipal governments and nonprofits after major heat events each summer.

The recommendations in the report cost little to implement — better signs, clearer messaging, wider awareness of buildings that already exist. What’s still missing is the political will to treat a building’s air conditioning as a matter of public safety before the next 114-degree day, not after it.