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