City earns Tree City designation, schedules Arbor Day tree giveaway

For the 20th year running, Mountain Brook has been named a Tree City USA, a designation awarded by the Arbor Day Foundation that the city shares with more than 3,400 communities across the nation. The city also earned a growth award.

The honor was delivered just a month shy of the city’s annual Arbor Day Tree Giveaway. The Mountain Brook Tree Commission will be giving away seedlings on March 8 from 9-11 a.m. in front of the Emmet O’Neal Library as well as at Western in Mountain Brook Village, Whole Foods in Cahaba Village and Piggly Wiggly in River Run.

This year’s selections include roughleaf dogwood, Eastern redbud, white oak, sweetbay magnolia, and longleaf with dogwood seedlings being handed out to elementary students. Tree Commission members will be on hand to provide planting tips and information about the trees.

Four things are required for a community to become a Tree City: the creation of a tree board or department, an ordinance giving the commission authority to create an annual forestry work plan, an annual forestry budget of approximately $2 per resident and an annual Arbor Day proclamation.

The Mountain Brook Tree Commission, a board of nine volunteers, works in conjunction with Don Cafaro, Mountain Brook’s senior arborist, to manage and care for the community’s trees.