WASHINGTON, DC (June 3, 2025) — Yesterday, Congresswoman Valerie Foushee (NC-04) and Congressman Ted Lieu (CA-36) sent a letter to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Acting Administrator Laura Grimm demanding the immediate restoration of the cancelled funding for the National Integrated Heat Health Information System (NIHHIS) Centers of Excellence.
In 2024, the NOAA made landmark investments to establish the Center for Collaborative Heat Monitoring, based at the Museum of Life and Science in Durham, NC, and the Center for Heat Resilient Communities, led by the Luskin Center for Innovation at the University of California – Los Angeles (UCLA) in Los Angeles, CA. In May, the Trump Administration made the decision to terminate a majority of the $4.55 million in funding contracts for these centers which help communities across the nation develop mitigation strategies and resilience planning. Extreme heat kills more Americans each year than any other weather-related event, and this grant termination will have a detrimental effect on Americans across the country.
The letter reads, in part:
“Extreme heat is a nonpartisan issue that affects all Americans. Rising summer temperatures put everyone at higher risk of heat-related illness or death. Whether you are living in an urban heat island, causing you to be more prone to the effects of extreme heat, or if you are living in a rural community that with fewer resources to address these problems, we must work together to develop comprehensive and community-oriented plans to mitigate the ever-compounding issues that arise from extreme heat.
We urge you to immediately reverse this cancellation and restore the full $4.55 million in funding for the NIHHIS Centers of Excellence and to honor the obligations made to protect Americans from the dangerous effects of extreme heat.”
The full text of the letter can be found here.