Oak Ridge celebrates Arbor Day
Oak Ridge officials joined the Glenwood Club Choir singers planting a tulip poplar tree near Glenwood Elementary School’s track.
The event came after a Glenwood Elementary School assembly for the city’s 39th Arbor Day observance and 36th year being recognized as a Tree City USA by the Arbor Day Foundation.
The event featured speeches by Recreation and Parks Director Jon Hetrick, Glenwood principal Ginny Boles, Environmental Quality Advisory Board Chairman Joel Hewett, Oak Ridge Mayor Warren Gooch, Deputy City Manager Jack Suggs and Oak Ridge City Electric Department Chair Craig Hickey. The choir sang two songs and student Evie Lovegrove read a poem.
“What do we plant when we plant the tree? We plant our love and our loyalty. We plant our devotion our memories dear that grow still more precious with each growing year,” Lovegrove said.
Keys Fillauer and Laura McLean of Oak Ridge Board of Education also attended.
To become a Tree City USA, a community must meet four standards: a legally constituted tree board; a community tree ordinance; a comprehensive community forestry program supported by a minimum of $2 per capita; and an Arbor
Day proclamation and public tree planting ceremony.
Communities must reapply for the Tree City USA designation annually. Arbor Day will officially arrive the last Friday in April nationally, but in Tennessee it’s the first Friday.
The Arbor Day Foundation explains its mission on its website arborday.org.