City Trees

pleased, I'd find them refusing the new trees because they didn't believe the city would maintain them. Community foresters showed me the effect trees have on disadvantaged and underserved neighborhoods, while seasoned municipal arborists introduced me to various strategies for management cycles and breaking city forests into neighborhood "stands." I learned how to work with multiple stakeholders with overlapping (and often competing) interests: parks departments, shade tree commissions, business administrators, coun- cilpersons, engineering departments, departments of environmental protection, and residents themselves. Through all of this, my discussions with other foresters brought me back to questions of different manage- ment strategies and how they affected residents and other stakeholders. Does the forestry department allow adjacent residents to have a say in what trees are planted on the right-of-way? Is the planting strip between the sidewalk and curb really the best place to focus planting? How do we decide pruning dosage and cycle length on a limited budget? Do councilpersons get special treatment? Which stakeholders have a finan- cial responsibility to assist in caring for public trees, if any? My discussions with foresters and stakeholders included some of these difficult questions and how various strategies might affect the stakeholders involved. CHANGING ROLES WITHOUT CHANGING PRIORITIES After a few rewarding years in consulting, I accepted a job offer with Asplundh and moved squarely into utility vegetation management (UVM). My new role was to assist a local utility in planning and executing tree work around high-voltage powerlines in a densely populated area. I made the move with mixed feelings; if I were to believe some of my peers in the consulting field, I'd just traded my tree-hugger hat for one that valued infra- structure above trees. I stepped into UVM with specific intentions: trees must be managed for competing inter- ests, and human health and well-being must always come first. As a budding urban forester with a passion for communication, working with people, and navigating difficult discussions, I felt I was well-qualified to help bridge the gap between UVM, other urban foresters, and community members who'd be affected by our decisions. Early on, I was surprised by how receptive most residents and municipal tree managers were to line clearance pruning. Many asked for extra pruning or removal. Of the people who didn't want their trees pruned, most hesitation seemed to stem from previous lack of noti- fication or other dissatisfaction with past work. Even then, they would usually come around once the amount of pruning and reasons for it were properly explained. STAKEHOLDER DISCOVERY: WHO CARES ABOUT THESE TREES? This receptiveness to utility pruning opened my eyes to a whole new level of stakeholder complexity in urban forestry. There were municipalities where I would have significant pushback from the shade tree commission but strong support from residents. Other areas were the opposite. I came to realize that my initial impressions >> urban-forestry.com 21 The author performs an outage investigation after this mature northern red oak (Quercus rubra) failed and knocked down five spans o high-voltage power lines in New Jersey.

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