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Empower Yourself...
Trees
Are Healing The Earth
by Kirsten Anderberg
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TreePeople Say Trees Are Like
Acupuncture Needles Healing The Earth
by Kirsten Anderberg
In a landscape with too much concrete, "TreePeople,"
based in Los Angeles, are reversing trends started with
the "ticky-tacky" tract housing in the San
Fernando Valley basin in the 1950's and 1960's. They
are beginning to unearth the living ecosystem hidden
underneath. For 30 years, a local environmental nonprofit
group dubbed "TreePeople," has provided an
international model for community urban forestry organizations.
Their hands-on, grassroots approach helps our environment
by cleaning our air and water, reducing the heat the
city is generating, and improving living habitats for
animals and children. Their work also helps repair damaged
burn areas, helping to prevent landslides as well as
floods. TreePeople are facilitating a natural beautification
and ecosystem restoration within the city, as well as
supporting empowerment, through investments in our own
local communities.
The benefits that TreePeople actions
bestow upon local areas are many. And their model can
be used in urban areas across America. The San Fernando
Valley, for instance, (which is located in Los Angeles
County), is 5-10 degrees hotter than rural areas outside
the city with trees and dirt, reaching a scorching 100+
degrees in summers nowadays. When the Valley was full
of orchards, not houses and freeways, it was cooler.
Additionally, a house with properly positioned trees
will have shade, using less fossil fuel on air conditioning
in summer, yet will also allow winter sun to hit the
house, reducing heating fuel consumption. Concrete cannot
absorb water, yet dirt with healthy trees can, thus
TreePeople's projects help prevent flooding. After fires
ravage lands, landslides often occur. TreePeople replant
trees in fire restoration and erosion prevention projects
to stabilize local hillsides. Trees reduce air pollution
by increasing oxygen production and providing CO2 absorption.
Additionally, community-based trees do not routinely
suffer from neglect or vandalism as they are community
investments.
As TreePeople increase the city's green space, they
are also changing schools' playgrounds from barren concrete
pens that look like jail yards, into places with green
grass and trees for shade. They also set up living horticulture
classrooms outdoors. TreePeople's recycling campaign
in the Los Angeles elementary schools was so effective
that parents began complaining to the schools that their
kids were badgering them into recycling! By giving local
communities the information and resources they need
to beautify their own schools, there is a resultant
humanization occurring in the city. It is unifying our
neighborhoods to get out and work together for a better
world.
Promoting "food security by increasing the self-reliance
of low-income communities," TreePeople teach horticulture
classes, as well as providing nutritious fruit trees,
to areas with the greatest economic needs in the Los
Angeles area. *I recommend this example be followed
in every single low-income urban area in America today.*
TreePeople promote bare root fruit trees, some of which
can bare fruit within 6 months. These trees are cheap,
easy to care for, and can produce an ample amount of
fruit for up to 40 years. Every year TreePeople buy
3,000 apple, plum, peach, apricot, fig and nectarine
trees. They work with food banks, community centers,
and religious organizations to help the residents plant
the trees to secure future food for their local neighborhoods.
Working to alleviate hunger, TreePeople have distributed
50,000 trees that locally produce tons of fruit each
year for some of Los Angeles' most barren neighborhoods.
And in the 1980's, TreePeople flew 6,000 fruit trees
to 6 African nations, teaching them about tree care
and helping fight rampant famine. Due to their superior
work, the survival rate for those trees in Africa was
an almost unprecedented 80 to 90%. Studies show that
government-planted trees on Los Angeles streets have
a 30% survival rate. Trees planted with the assistance
of TreePeople have a 93% survival rate, due to the education
of the community about how to take care of their trees
and the community involvement with the trees.
The TreePeople website http://www.treepeople.com has
a downloadable "Home Forester worksheet."
In "Step One" of their Home Forester worksheet,
TreePeople ask you to "Explore your property to
discover the remnants of the living ecosystem."
They ask questions about the soil, how much of it is
unpaved, are there plants and bugs, has there been chemical
spraying in the past? They ask what happens when rain
falls. Do the soil, trees, lawns and gardens absorb
the water? How much runs off site and what does it take
with it in the way of lawn fertilizers, oil stains on
the driveway, etc. They ask you to assess the trees
on your property. Are they planted in strategic locations,
do they capture rain, do they shade the south and west
walls facing the sun, do they allow winter sun to warm
the home, are they beautiful and fragrant, do they provide
fruit, do they attract wildlife, can children play safely
in them, etc.? "Step One" also asks you to
assess your use of urban forest products, such as using
fallen leaves and branches, as well as lawn clippings,
as mulch. They ask you to look at how much "green
waste" you produce each year and ask you to look
at where that green waste ends up, in a landfill, or
recycled to be used to make your locale greener.
"Step Two" of the TreePeople's Home Forester
worksheet asks us to "Look for places where you
can remove concrete to alter the landscape or hardscape
to repair and restore nature's interrupted systems."
They ask you to find places to remove concrete or asphalt
to make space for trees, soil and plants, and they ask
you to find local trees and garden beds to mulch with
your green waste to recycle nutrients and retain water.
They discuss using cisterns for rain collection and
the use of gray water from washing machines, showers
and sinks for irrigation use.
"Step Three" of the worksheet asks for an
assessment of benefits that the urban reforestation
would give the community. They ask you to assess your
local flood threats, and also to follow where your waste
water goes.to see if it is contributing to pollution
downstream. They ask you to assess the cost of importing
water from distant lands to your area. They ask you
assess the local landfill situation to see if waste
could be reduced by educational recycling programs.
They ask you to assess air pollution and air quality
issues due to generation of electricity, as well as
issues of global warming. Then they ask you to prioritize
the things you could do to provide the greatest impacts
with the least investments, on your own property as
well as the neighborhood properties, for improvements
to life quality.
TreePeople stress the fact that urban reforestation
is not easy. The task requires "great planning,
thorough paperwork, skilled recruitment, tact, knowledge
of how trees and city agencies work, negotiating ability,
fundraising talent and, sometimes, conflict resolution."
TreePeople advocate planting "the right tree in
the right place." They recommend groups look at
strategic tree placement for shading, they recommend
proper tree choices for the site's soil, lighting, etc.,
as well as discussing proper foresight regarding future
maintenance issues. They say that sometimes the right
trees are native trees, but sometimes the landscape
has changed so drastically that the native trees of
a century ago are not surviving as well in the new environment.
And in those cases, specifics will be taken into account
and the right tree picked for the site's irrigation,
proximity to traffic, etc. And no matter how well chosen,
trees will die if not properly cared for. TreePeople
take maintenance very seriously and always teach communities
how to care for the trees that are planted.
The humble beginnings of TreePeople is an inspirational
one, one that can encourage us to look around our own
communities for resources that can better our own lives
today. Andy Lipkis started the California Conservation
Project in the 1970's by simply asking the California
Dept. of Forestry for its surplus of 8,000 extra seedlings.
Later he tied the Air Quality Management Plan and the
1970 Clean Air Act in with the planting efforts. When
the City of Los Angeles estimated it would cost "$200
million and would take 20 years" to accomplish
some of the reforestation goals set forth, Lipkis and
the TreePeople offered to do the plantings, and to meet
the goals, in three years. Are there surplus trees in
your area's Foresty Dept.? Are there ways you could
get funding for urban reforestation, by explaining the
benefits to the community as a whole, therein? Could
you use the school systems for recycling education?
Is there a way to collectively reduce green waste and
use gray water in your community? All of these are things
you and I can look into today to better our local communities.
And most importantly, could you help spearhead a planting
of fruit trees in your local low-income neighborhoods?
All of these things are within our reach.
TreePeople does not have a national affiliate, and is
a local Los Angeles organization. But TreePeople have
served as an inspirational model for dozens of groups
around the world. The founder of TreePeople, Andy Lipkis,
is also on the National Tree Trust http://www.nationaltreetrust.org
which "provides resources and funding to local
volunteer groups across the country." TreePeople
is also involved with both California Releaf http://www.nationaltreetrust.org/releaf/,
a network of local California tree groups, and the Alliance
for Community Trees http://www.actrees.org , a national
support network. Although TreePeople do not help people
plant trees in states outside California, they recommend
visiting http://www.treelink.org for a wealth of information
about tree groups across the nation.
By using urban reforestation and education techniques
pioneered by TreePeople, we can not only lower the temperature
in cities by 5-10 degrees, but we can also reduce our
dependence on imported water while still maintaining
green spaces. We can reduce pollution in the water and
the air, we can reduce floods and landslides, as well
as reducing the burden upon our landfills. We can decrease
our dependence on energy for heating and cooling our
houses by utilizing proper tree placement and we can
not only beautify our school playgrounds, streets and
neighborhoods, but we can feed the hungry in the inner
city as well. As you can see, trees have a greater influence
on things than many realize. By becoming aware of our
surroundings, and working together, we can take part
in issues such as local waste management, as well as
getting connected with our own city streets in a hand-on
fashion.
Kirsten Anderberg is
the mother of a draft-aged son, an activist, feminist
comedian, and prolific journalist/writer. She discusses
police accountability, midwifery, accommodating vegetarians
at winter holiday events, teens' rights to political
dissent, street performance, medicinal uses of stinging
nettles, and much more. You can find her articles in
Infoshop.org, Alternative Press Review (altpr.org),
Utne.com, Zmag.org, Adbusters Magazine, Hipmama.com,
Slingshot Zine and at her website www.kirstenanderberg.com
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