In Spring 2024, Western Water Assessment launched a new project focusing on understanding risks to natural hazards such as wildfire smoke and extreme heat and building resilience within mobile home park communities. Mobile home park residents face unique and disproportionate exposure to natural hazards, including heat, wildfires, and flooding. Further, mobile home residents often are left out of many hazard and disaster-related assistance programs, due to the unique housing structure of mobile home parks. Addressing the needs of mobile home park communities is key to building resilience.

Western Water Assessment received funding from the CIRES Innovative Research Program and the University of Colorado Boulder Community Impact Grant to collaborate with University of Colorado Boulder Geographer Colleen Reid on a mixed method study of the natural hazards facing Colorado mobile home communities, focusing in particular on the intersecting hazards of extreme heat and wildfire smoke.

Starting in Summer 2024, this research will employ in-depth interviews with mobile home residents about the impacts of extreme heat and smoke, and also employ a pilot program on air quality monitors and temperature and relative humidity monitors within mobile homes in order to measure indoor air quality and heat exposure. This mixed method approach will allow us to quantify heat and smoke exposure within mobile homes, and aid in understanding the impacts of heat and smoke on the health and well-being of mobile home park residents.

Over the next two years, Western Water Assessment plans to work in several different mobile home parks in Colorado in order to understand the unique hazard risks and resilience needs of these parks. These results can help inform policy by identifying key areas of concern and strategies that can help address these hazard resilience needs.