Tree Report Card: Areas to Improve

You, friend, are a tree enthusiast. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be here. So you, as a tree enthusiast, want to know what you can do to take D.C. from scoring an Incomplete on our Tree Report Card to getting straight A’s. We like that about you.

Luckily for everyone, we included toward the end of our Tree Report Card suggestions for ways we can improve our tree canopy.

Because the Incomplete was issued for Tree Protection, a judgement based on the ineffectiveness of the Urban Forest Preservation Act and the promise of the Urban Forestry Administration Reorganization Act, the bulk of our recommendations are rooted in legislative change. You as a constituent can reach out to your councilmember and tell them you’re concerned about the trees in our city.

We recommend the following actions:

• Release UFA-DDOT from its current task of administering the UFPA.
  UFA-DDOT’s mission of managing the city’s 140,000 street trees in the public rights-of-way is a huge job. It will never be completely successful if it must administer a law that lies outside its jurisdiction in the private space.
• Formally recognize DDOE as the lead agency in charge of alllands tree policy, including administration of the UFPA, as is prescribed in its enabling legislation.
  DDOE must build its capacity so it can administer the UFPA, respond to public and private space tree issues outside the rightsof-way, and oversee private property tree canopy preservation and expansion through programs, incentives and legislation.
• Relocate the D.C. State Forester function to DDOE.
  The D.C. State Forester’s office functions under the umbrella of UFA-DDOT and, as such, is responsible solely for the city’s street trees. No other State Forestry office in the U.S. has such a narrowly defined role. The federal dollars that support the D.C. State Forester function should benefit all the trees in the District on both public and private lands, not just street trees.

Read the rest of our recommendations and the rest of the Tree Report Card to find other ways the city can improve.

Have questions? Join us on May 10 at noon for our Tree Talk Thursdays online chat with our Executive Director Mark Buscaino. We will answer all of your questions about the report card and issues of tree canopy protection in D.C.