Lesson #1: Stewardship is
long-lived and impactful
Local stewardship groups persist over time through everyday
acts of care. While some stewardship groups originated in the
18th century, the number of stewardship groups in our U.S.
locations has steadily increased since the 1970s, and is asso-
ciated with the modern American environmental movement
as well as the Hawaiian cultural renaissance. We find similar
patterns in the Colombia and Dominican Republic datasets,
reflecting the neighborhood associations that formed in the
1980s to improve quality of life. While many places include
contributions from national and regional groups, STEW-MAP
focused on the smaller, local groups that play a special role
in the urban forest—holding the public trust and cultivating
local knowledge. To showcase the diversity of these groups,
we developed a professionalization index and a capacity index.
The professionalization index reflects the number of staff and
the size of the budget, while the capacity index reflects the
number of social network ties and any one group's ability to
reach the landscape of people taking care of their place and
supporting community sustainability. Together, alongside inter-
view data, these show the unique contribution and strength
of each group and the whole in impacting their surroundings.
Lesson #2: Stewards are agents of
change, socially and ecologically
Stewardship groups manage and transform environments
and communities through care, direct action, hands-on work,
education, and advocacy. For example, areas in Baltimore
with more tree canopy and volunteer-initiated stormwater
green infrastructure tend to have more stewardship groups.
In Medellín, Colombia, the use of i-Tree and STEW-MAP in
tandem showed a positive association between ecosystem
benefits and the number of civic groups and links among them.
We've also found that many groups focus on topics beyond
the environment, like youth, seniors, social services, and the
arts. In fact, in NYC, we found it challenging to disentangle a
"social component" from an "environmental component" in
survey responses. Similarly, in Hawai'i, education and cultural
practice emerged as highly salient themes, alongside conser-
vation. The social component is implemented as community
development and social trust, with groups activating green
space to function as social infrastructure or communal spaces.
Stewardship groups are working to advance overall quality of
life and sustainability, and they are using unique metrics to
interpret and measure success of urban forestry programs.
22 CityTREES
