Project Details:
A multi-municipal committee serving as both the Shade Tree Commission and the Environmental Council for the EDS area --- the committee will include interested participants from all of the EDS municipalities and will actively create a network of volunteers for environmental (“greening”) projects. The planned activities of each function of the committee would include:

EDS Environmental Committee

Shade Tree Commission

Lot Reclamation/General Greening

Tree Inventory Securing Resources (Grants/Trees/Supplies) Building a Network of Volunteers Non-Binding Recommendations to Boroughs Monitoring of Existing Tree Stock Etc.

Identification of Lot Reclamation Sites Identification of Greening Sites Prioritization of Sites Securing Donations/Resources/Volunteers Cohesive approach to beautification Etc.

Project Rationale:

Both of these initiatives would be administered by the “umbrella” EDS Environmental Committee. Although these are typically separate entities, the idea is to keep them combined to maximize participation – then split them into separate groups at a later date.

The rationale for this effort is that we make a larger impact by consolidating the efforts of volunteers/smaller environmental groups within each municipality. We can secure more resources and donations as a larger entity, and can then prioritize projects and coordinate volunteers from across the EDS communities. The Environmental Committee will help to effectively:

• Prioritize Sites
• Create Inventories
• Secure Grants/Material Donations

If successful, the EDS EC will be able to do numerous smaller scale greening projects a year, with very little capital requirements because of the planned reliance on donated goods/services and volunteerism.