Tree Committee takes root in Watervliet

WATERVLIET, N.Y. » City officials said they are pleased that they are beginning to move forward with state funding that they received last year as part of the Urban Forestry Inventory Project.

Last year city officials approved a resolution to apply for the funding through the state, and in October they found out they were awarded $38,268 to go towards a tree inventory program.

The Urban Forestry grants are funded through the state Environmental Protection Fund and are part of New York’s ongoing initiatives to address invasive species, climate change and environmental justice.

Grants were made available to municipalities, public benefit corporations, public authorities, school districts, soil and water conservation districts, community colleges, not-for-profit organizations, and Indian Nations. Awards range from $11,000 to $75,000, depending on municipal population. Tree inventories and community forestry management plans have no match. Tree planting and maintenance projects have a 25 percent match.

During Thursday night’s City Council meeting, the council unanimously approved a pair of resolutions related to the tree inventory project.

The first resolution passed appointed five people to serve on the city of Watervliet Tree Committee, and the council also accepted a proposal from Davey Resource Group, Inc., to provide consulting services for the Watervliet Urban Forestry Inventory Project.

City officials said Davey Resource Group, Inc. will take an inventory of every tree on city property that’s existent, and also identify areas that the city could use trees and it would also identify the condition of the trees and the types of trees.

During the inventory process city officials said the consulting group will also identify places that have stumps and places that could use a tree removed. City officials expect the tree inventory process to hopefully be completed by early summer time.

Councilman Charles Patricelli said he pushed the council to apply for the grant and is hopeful the program will make the city look better to residents and visitors alike.

“I think trees are actually taken so much for granted,” said Patricelli. “Anybody will know when a neighborhood has some of these trees that have to come down because of their age or whatever reason; you know it looks bare and kind of stark in a sense. Having trees put in and kept up I think is important to the community’s integrity and it improves property values in so many ways.”

Mayor Michael Manning believes that the grant funding for this tree project will also help the city be able to remove dead trees and stumps, and said that it would be pretty expensive if the city had to fix these issues without any grant funding.

“When they are near a road or a sidewalk, as these trees grow and if they weren’t selected properly for an urban setting, they grow so large that their roots [end] up lifting the sidewalk creating safety hazards and it’s not inexpensive to deal with that problem; redoing sidewalks, removing a tree, removing a stump is expensive so this puts us in a position to get some grant funding to take care of some of those.”