Gene DeSantis, an MVP to local greening outfits, has planted 15,223 trees over the past 40 years—proving that one person can make a big difference, little by little over time. He started the hobby as a form of therapy to get over a troubling childhood. His stepfather was an alcoholic and his mother a drug addict. As a child, when his stepfather would lash out in drunken violence, DeSantis would climb trees in the yard and find peace. “Trees became my friends,” he says. “You could say I kind of grew up there.”
However, it wasn’t until after his stepfather murdered his mother and then committed suicide that DeSantis started planting trees instead of climbing them. “I was angry inside because I thought the world was so unfair,” he says. “The picking and shoveling helped me reduce a lot of the anger that I had.”
The first tree he ever planted was a year after moving in with his grandmother in southeast Baltimore, Maryland, following the death of his parents. He was 18 years old; now he is 57 and still planting trees every Saturday in the park. He also enjoys spending his morning delivering PB&Js to homeless people near the harbor, serving hot meals at a church-sponsored employment center called Our Daily Bread, and baking cookies for elderly folks at the Karis Home shelter. His good deeds are another form of release, a positive way to ease his childhood traumas. “I try to get past that,” he says. “I mean, you can’t ever forget it.”
And although the relief he felt among the branches might be unique to him, the fact is that trees have been scientifically proven to possess restorative qualities for everyone. Research shows that stress levels, heart rate, muscle tension, asthma rates, and blood pressure all decrease in their presence. Not only do urban woods help residents de-stress, but they also benefit the environment by trapping pollution, absorbing auto emissions, and cooling scorching sidewalks. Baltimore’s cumulative 14,000 acres of canopy, for instance, ensnares in excess of 550,000 tons of carbon per year—offsetting 54 days’ worth of emissions from the city’s more than 600,000 residents.
Dan Lambe, president of the Arbor Day Foundation, the country’s largest tree-planting nonprofit, said, “Few amenities better reveal the overall vigor of a city than its canopy: the mix of trees that line streets, envelop parks, and shade homes. They’re doing so much more to instill true health and wellness to a community.”
Yet, can you believe that despite all those benefits, America’s metropolitan cover is shrinking year after year ever more? Data from the United States Forest Service shows a decrease of 36 million urban trees between 2009 and 2014, which is 175,000 acres each year. And then there’s Baltimore defying all odds, with its reputation as a gritty port town running counter to the stats. Its forest is growing by upwards of 5,000 new trees per year. How? By spending the past four decades enlisting data and an active cadre of volunteers like DeSantis, community groups, and nonprofits to plant trees. All these efforts have made Charm City a standard-bearer for urban reforestation and a model for what’s possible across the nation.
All of the city’s effort drew federal attention. In 1993, the Forest Service awarded the city $2.5 million for a program called Revitalizing Baltimore, tasked with planting more than 17,000 trees over 10 years. As Revitalizing Baltimore learned to coordinate with multiple stakeholders, a separate initiative was born that was focused on collecting the data that city forester Gary Letteron and others needed to defend investment in trees. “The mission was to develop a transferable model for community forestry,” Letteron recalls. Their mission ended up influencing the landscape beyond Baltimore. It helped map the support structures, resources, and collaborators necessary for other towns to expand and maintain urban canopies by following their example.
Another organization, TreeBaltimore, has an overall goal to increase the city’s total canopy from 28% to 40% by 2037. They are very strategic about their planting too. TreeBaltimore collaborates with some 60 local organizations to create a map that pinpoints where new roots can do the most good. A group interested in protecting the bay, for instance, can use the chart to see where impervious surfaces cause frequent flooding and then target surrounding land for new trees. “You’re tying trees to the actual benefit that they’re providing,” says Charles Murphy, the office’s operations lead. The chart also helps the group identify spots where more shade might benefit people. “We don’t turn away people who want a tree,” Murphy explains, “but if we are targeting neighborhoods for larger-scale planting, then we go to the map.”
They are always in need of volunteers, so if you’re up for planting trees, help TreeBaltimore accomplish their mission. If you’re not in Baltimore, check around about how you can plant trees in your own city. Together, we can increase the whole world’s urban canopy up to a healthy and beautiful level!
