By Eric Raven, Guest Column

Happy Arbor Day! I know this column may not print on Arbor Day, but why can&8217;t every day be Arbor Day? I&8217;m writing this to express my love for trees and my sincere desire to help keep Albert Lea a truly green and healthy community.

Arbor Day is a nationally celebrated observance that encourages tree planting and care. Founded in 1872 by J. Sterling Morton, National Arbor Day is celebrated each year on the last Friday in April. Morton started Arbor Day in Nebraska to try to beautify the Midwestern landscape because he realized the benefits that trees can offer us.

Trees give us shade to help cool our towns. They soak up thousands of gallons of rainwater, which helps keep our lakes cleaner. They provide erosion control, homes for animals, and lately we&8217;ve come to realize that trees store carbon in their trunk and limbs, which helps to offset greenhouse gases and therefore global warming, too. As a byproduct of their carbon-storage process, trees also make oxygen! If you can show me something else that makes oxygen for free, then I&8217;ll jump right on that bandwagon too.

About 80 percent of today&8217;s population lives in urban areas. Trees in community forests are valuable for recreation, aesthetics, wildlife habitat, energy conservation, natural visual screens, and natural filters along waterways. Trees capture more of the sun&8217;s energy than any other organism. All living organisms on earth capture only 0.1 percent of the sun&8217;s radiant energy, trees alone capture 50 percent of that 0.1 percent.

Trees are incredible living structures, they are the tallest, most massive, and longest lived organisms on earth. We all owe a special thank you to the trees for giving us such a beautiful and hospitable planet on which to live.

As a working arborist here in Albert Lea for the last two years, I have noticed a disturbing trend in this town. It seems that there is a general lack of respect and disregard for our oldest elders by

too many people, both public servants and private homeowners.

Too many times I have seen trees cut down for reasons such as: &8220;It&8217;s so messy,&8221; &8220;There&8217;s too much shade on my lawn,&8221; &8220;We need to build a new garage,&8221; or this is the best one, &8220;It&8217;s too tall.&8221; Too tall for what? Is it going to hit the sky?

Now, I&8217;m all for removing trees if they are hazardous due to decay, disease, storm damage, or just plain old age. In fact, I do it myself almost every day. But I feel that it&8217;s high time that we start giving healthy trees the respect they deserve.

If a tree is not hazardous or dying, then it should not be cut down for any reason. There should be laws and ordinances in place to protect trees and if someone wants to remove a tree to build a new patio or sidewalk the project should be reviewed by an unbiased panel or tree board to assess the benefits versus cost of losing a valuable oxygen producer. If viable healthy trees do need to be removed, then the tree owner or perpetrator should be made to pay a fee into some kind of special tree fund to help offset the cost of new tree planting.

The National Arbor Day Foundation has given Albert Lea the prestigious award of Tree City USA. There are four criteria to achieve and maintain this status: 1. Our city must allocate $2 per citizen per year for tree planting and maintenance. 2. We have established a special tree board (the Parks and Recreation Advisory Board) 3. We hold a special Arbor Day celebration each year in conjunction with National Arbor Day. 4. We have developed a city tree ordinance that should be a guide to help promote the planting and proper care of trees in our city.

It has been my observation that we do not deserve to be called a Tree City USA because of our lack of respect for trees in general and our lackluster and feeble attempts at compliance with the four criteria.

The special &8220;tree board&8221; is nothing more than token entity and doesn&8217;t spend much time talking about our trees. The tree ordinance is a farce; it&8217;s nothing more than a tree-removal ordinance designed to protect the city from litigation in the event of an emergency hazard tree removal and says nothing positive about tree planting or preservation. And what about the Arbor Day Celebration? When is it? Where is it? If it has been scheduled, then that&8217;s great, but it seems that we&8217;ve failed in the marketing department.

My wife and have attempted to save the four large native burr oaks on South Washington Avenue because we saw what we thought was obvious to everyone, these trees are beneficial and irreplaceable.

They were heritage trees, meaning that they have a historical significance to our town. They have been growing here for roughly 150 years. Actual ring counts vary from 147 years on one stump to 155 years on another. I also counted 137 growth rings on a slice taken from about 30 feet up. Further evidence discovered during the post-mortem suggests that someone may have cared for these trees and actually nurtured their growth at a very young age, perhaps one of the original settlers here.

Considering the fact that

these trees were healthy and hearty and

they can live 300 to 400 years, it seems they were cut down in the prime of their useful life, with little regard for past or future generations of Albert Leans.

Many cities now have in place a heritage tree preservation ordinance that protects their oldest and biggest, and some even require a permit and site evaluation before removing any tree. This could be a very useful tool for avoiding costly mistakes in the future, and help to ensure that our kids and grandkids will still have a nice place to live. If you&8217;re as concerned as I am then call or write to your Albert Lea City Council member or attend a City Council meeting and let your voice be heard!

Thank you for listening, and think trees!

Arborist Eric Raven resides in Albert Lea.