Elise Otto

Elise Otto is a PhD candidate in the School of Geography, Development, and Environment at the University of Arizona. Her research focuses on heat vulnerability and housing insecurity, and how legal and economic structures shape residents' ability to stay cool and stay housed during extreme heat. She combines ethnographic methods and in-home temperature monitoring to understand how policy shapes thermal comfort in manufactured home communities across Southern Arizona. Elise is motivated to build collaborations with community organizations and policymakers so that her research can directly inform advocacy and legislative action on affordable, climate-resilient housing.  She holds a Master's degree in Earth Sciences from Montana State University and a degree in Geology from Whitman College. When not in school, Elise loves being outside with friends and family and near water whenever possible. 

Master-Metered Utilities, Extreme Heat, and Housing Vulnerability in Manufactured Home Parks in Southern Arizona

Each year, extreme heat kills more Americans than any other weather-related hazard, and residents of manufactured or mobile homes (MH) are among the most exposed. In Arizona, MH residents are six times more likely to die from heat inside their homes than residents of any other housing type. MH are factory-built homes placed in parks where residents own their homes but rent the land and utility infrastructure from park owners — making MH the largest form of unsubsidized affordable housing in the United States, and a particularly significant share of the housing stock in Southern Arizona. Policy makers and researchers have emphasized the age and energy inefficiency of older MH structures as a key driver of this disparity, but my research demonstrates that heat vulnerability among MH residents is not solely shaped by aging physical structures — it is also produced by legal and economic constraints that force residents to choose between staying housed and staying cool. In particular, the regulatory gap around park-owner-controlled, master-metered utility systems — which can leave residents without utility protections or recourse when bills are inflated or power is cut — is a nexus of vulnerability that remains largely invisible to the public and to policymakers outside the manufactured housing world. Through ongoing collaborations with community groups, this project produces accessible communication materials that connect the mechanisms of master-metered utility systems to heat and housing vulnerability in MH communities, and draws on examples from other states to support community organizations and policymakers in their work toward secure, climate-resilient, affordable housing.