If I Had a (Sledge) Hammer

Breaking up the pavement around your home and in your community is pretty easy, but aside from having a good excuse to use a sledgehammer, why would you want to?  The simple answer is that the more permeability we are able to create in our yards and urban environment, the healthier the watershed. When water…

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The Future Is In Our Hands, Harvest Moon 2014

The Future is in Our Hands, Harvest Moon 2014 Nearly two weeks have gone by and people are still talking about TreePeople’s annual gala An Evening Under the Harvest Moon. Thanks to all our donors and sponsors along with all those behind the scenes who helped in making it an exceptional night! There was a…

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We Can Do It!

A recent story on NPR noted an environmental change for the better: the ozone layer is on the mend. Which, if you are worried about skin cancer, climate change and the like, is great news – and history in the making! So how did this happen? First, people heard a hard truth: that chlorofluorocarbons –…

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TreePeople Needs YOUR Vote for a More Livable Future!

Recently, LA2050 asked a provocative question: how would YOU use $100,000 to make Los Angeles the healthiest place to live? It’s a great question, and we have our answer: TreeMapLA. By continuing to build TreeMapLA as a simple, powerful, and user-friendly tool, we will enable residents of Los Angeles County to use the map to become…

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Water For Us All!

“We have enough water to live on, but not enough to waste.” — Dorothy Green, founding president of Heal the Bay. Dorothy Green wrote these words in an article that was published in the LA Times in 2008, shortly before her death. In it, she outlines an incredibly thoughtful set of recommendations that would create…

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Intern Spotlight: Jazmine Saucedo

My name is Jazmine Saucedo, and I am TreePeople. Working with Jack London Continuation High School students through TreePeople’s Youth Summer Tree Care Project has definitely been the highlight of my summer. As a Summer Tree Care Intern, I encouraged and motivated students of underserved areas to care for their environment. This internship provided me…

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Volunteer Celebration 2014

About a week ago, we hosted our annual Volunteer Celebration. This was a special opportunity for our highly dedicated volunteers to gather in a casual environment and get to know one another a bit better. We realize that it can be tough for staff and volunteers to get to know one another at forestry events,…

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TreePeople Volunteer Takes on the Drought

This past Sunday, TreePeople staff and volunteers participated in a special tree care event in North Hollywood. One of our enthusiastic Volunteer Supervisors, Vahagn Karapetyan, had noticed that the trees in his neighborhood were suffering, so he decided to take action. Vahagn Karapetyan has been volunteering with TreePeople for the past two and a half…

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AB 2403 Sets the Stage for Stormwater Capture

It doesn’t rain much in Los Angeles, but it does rain: in an average year, enough rain falls throughout Los Angeles County to supply 650,000 families with enough water to live off if we captured it. For this reason, for more than twenty years TreePeople has been championing rainwater harvesting as a key part of…

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Fighting Drought One Lawn at a Time: LADWP’s Cash In Your Lawn Program

One hundred percent of California is now in a severe drought, and Los Angeles County is even worse off, classified by the United States Drought Monitor  as in “extreme drought” conditions. Now, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) is calling on Angelenos to do their part to conserve water—and as an incentive,…

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The Importance of Environmental Education

Earlier this week, The Nature of Cities held an online roundtable about the importance of urban environmental education and what makes an effective educational program. Featured in the roundtable was TreePeople’s Senior Manager for Environmental Education, Candice Russell. The Nature of Cities has allowed us to repost Candice’s essay here, so read on to learn…

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Celebrating Trees on World Environment Day: A Guest Post by Michael Zucker

Today is World Environment Day, designed by the United Nations to encourage “worldwide awareness and action for the environment.” Here at TreePeople, we strive daily to create spaces and programs in which Los Angeles community members can participate in creating a sustainable, thriving city. Last month, Michael Zucker, author of the “A Sustainable Conversation” column…

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