Image Courtesy of Illinois State University
NORMAL, Ill. – The City of Bloomington was named as a Tree City USA Community by the non-profit Arbor Day Foundation. Superintendent of Park Maintenance Jeff Hindman spoke about what it means to have Bloomington become a Tree City, as well as the qualifications and ceremony taking place to celebrate the title.
“In order to receive the award, we have to have a tree board or department, which we have our forestry division,” Hindman said. “We have to have a tree care ordinance, which we do have in place, which is actually being revised now.”
Bloomington replants trees to upkeep their environmental status for the community, which is a quality that Tree Cities often possess.
“Basically, for every tree that we remove, we replant a tree and actually go above and beyond that,” Hindman said. “We have well over 4,000, probably 5,000 city parkway trees, and then we probably have that many in our park system as well that we maintain as well. We have three full-time foresters, so we are working on trees year-round.”
The planting tree program trims roughly 1,000 trees annually.
Hindman explained how a number of communities are given the award and what the criteria are.
“You submit an application, and in that application, for these requirements… we will go in and capture the number of trees that we plant, the number of trees that we remove, money that we spend on trees, trimming as well as treating trees,” Hindman said.
To celebrate the cause, an Arbor Day celebration will take place at Cedar Ridge School, where a tree is planted to honor the Tree City title.
This year will mark the sixth year Bloomington has been recognized as a Tree City.