LAS VEGAS (FOX5) — Students and local officials came together March 31 to plant new trees as a way to fight extreme heat.
The trees went into the ground at Southeast Career Technical Academy. The ceremony highlighted Clark County’s Community Canopy program, now in its third year.
The program brings thousands of free, drought-tolerant trees to neighborhoods hit hardest by urban heat. Clark County distributes 4,500 drought-tolerant trees free to the community every year through the program, which is run in partnership with the Arbor Day Foundation. Priority is given to those most vulnerable to heat.
“Some environmental issues that we can raise awareness about today is the heat island effect. As someone who’s going into the healthcare field, I care about preventive care, which means addressing your health before it reaches the clinic. And we can do that by addressing pollution, resource conservation, and reducing waste,” said Whitney Ho, secretary of SECTA’s Environmental Club.
Ho said planting trees is a way to advocate for green spaces in urban areas.
MORE ON FOX5: UNLV, Vegas community fighting extreme heat by planting thousands of trees
“As we plant this tree today, we are advocating for green spaces,” Ho said. “Trees are very efficient at converting carbon dioxide into oxygen. While oxygen is very important for us, for our bodies to create energy, carbon dioxide traps heat into our atmosphere, which causes extreme temperatures that we are currently facing.”
SECTA’s Environmental Club has over 40 active members and has grown into one of the largest and most dedicated student organizations on campus. The club recently partnered with Get Outdoors Nevada to clean up a local park in the northeast valley.
After learning about the 90% decline in the monarch butterfly population, the Environmental Club joined with the Western Monarch Count and added a monarch butterfly sanctuary to the school garden by planting milkweed. The club is also experimenting with electroculture, using copper antenna to see if they can naturally increase the growth and vitality of plants in the garden.
Jody Bechtel, deputy director of Clark County’s Department of Environment and Sustainability, said extreme heat is a serious environmental challenge facing the community.
“In 2024, it was the hottest summer on record, and we continue to experience longer high heat and increased nighttime heat, which prevents infrastructure and people from cooling down,” Bechtel said.
U.S. Rep. Dina Titus attended the event and said heat kills more people than tornadoes and hurricanes put together.
The tree effort is funded by a mix of federal agencies including the EPA and USDA, along with local governments.
Copyright 2026 KVVU. All rights reserved.
