The State We're In

Jul 25, 2024

by Jay Watson, Co-Executive Director, New Jersey Conservation Foundation

The canopy of trees in this state we’re in is not evenly distributed – the proof is a click away, at American Forests’ Tree Equity Score website, where punching in a ZIP code shows you how tree-abundant your town is compared with other communities.

Cities generally score lowest on the map for obvious reasons. In the built environment, endless stretches of concrete and asphalt prevent water and oxygen from reaching root zones. Compacted and unhealthy soil contributes to the struggle to survive. The micro-climates in cities, including air pollutants and winter street salting, don’t make for great growing conditions, either.

But to paint a picture of statewide apathy when it comes to the unequal distribution of trees in places like Trenton and Camden would be misleading, too. As more of us recognize why urban trees matter – cooling the environment, sequestering carbon, absorbing storm water, and supporting biodiversity – more of us are stepping up to help.

An incredible partnership of nonprofits and government agencies convened by New Jersey Conservation Foundation planted 100 trees in Trenton’s Cadwalader Park this past May. That work was made possible through a Natural Climate Solutions grant awarded by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection. Another 1,000 or more trees will be planted in Trenton over the next three years. One nonprofit, New Jersey Tree Foundation, makes an exclusive mission of getting trees into underserved cities. Since its 1998 inception, the organization has planted more than 260,000 trees, and with an impressive 95 percent survival rate. But the Tree Foundation doesn’t just bring trees to cities. One of its programs, Green Streets, brings the city of Newark to trees.

Lisa Simms, Green Streets’ director, started the program in 2006 with funding from a Natural Resource Damages grant. “I had wanted to do some kind of re-entry program for years,” she said. “But we never had the money.”

Re-entry programs help people who have spent time in jail or prison ready themselves for the transition back into communities. Simms’s idea involved working with the New Jersey State Parole Board to hire parolees as a tree planting crew; the Natural Resource Damages money had given the foundation the means to plant thousands in Bergen, Essex, and other counties. “We were supposed to get the trees planted in four years, but we met our goal within two and a half or three,” she said.

The dedication and hard work of Green Streets’ first crew – five men who were living in a Newark re-entry facility, trained by Tree Foundation staff – encouraged Simms to start bidding on tree-planting contract work in suburban communities outside of Newark. Now the program funds itself.

Green Streets has planted 27,959 trees and hired 134 men, usually 8 to 10 per year, since its launch, Simms said. The canopies it’s responsible for building now provide shade in nearly every county in New Jersey. For the men, the digging, planting, and watering amounts to more than valuable work experience, the kind that can help secure full-time jobs in the future.

Many of the workers haven’t had opportunities to interact with nature outside city limits, Simms said. “So getting to see different parts of New Jersey can be eye-opening for them. Sometimes you see this kind of lightbulb moment where these gentlemen who’ve spent their lives in cities are like, ‘My street doesn’t have many trees, and it’s really hot.’ That probably wasn’t even a thought before they started, because most people only notice trees on a subconscious level.”

Green Street’s planting jobs happen in spring and fall. The towns it works with pick which species go into the ground. “But we’ll call out a tree that shouldn’t be planted, like the Callery pear, which is highly invasive,” Simms said. Overall, New Jersey communities are getting better at diversifying and choosing native trees like serviceberry, hawthorn, and American elm, she said.

This time of year, Green Streets’ workers don’t rest. Since late May, crew manager James Cunningham, a graduate of the program, has been leading tree maintenance work on 11 acres of former brownfields at Liberty State Park in Jersey City. The team gets started early, at 7 a.m., and is often on the job six days a week.

“It’s a highly urban park, but some of the men didn’t even know it was there,” Simms said. For many it’s become more than a work site. “Once they start caring for trees and knowing they can come back in five years and see how those trees have grown, it becomes a different ball game for them. The trees become their babies.”

Simms feels the same way about Green Streets: “The fact that it’s been around all these years, that we’re part of people learning how important trees are to people’s health and well-being – it’s the greatest feeling. It makes my heart sing.”

Nothing is going to create trust and a feeling of ownership of these green investments more than people from the community leading the charge and speaking to the values of this work. Thanks to New Jersey Tree Foundation and the Green Streets team, we are on our way.

To check your community’s tree equity score, visit https://www.treeequityscore.org

To learn more about New Jersey Tree Foundation’s Green Streets program, go to https://njtrees.org/green-streets/

And for information about preserving New Jersey’s land and natural resources, visit the New Jersey Conservation Foundation website at www.njconservation.org or contact me at info@njconservation.org.