Newport This Week

Tree Planting Initiatives Bearing Fruit



The Middletown Tree Commission is wrapping up the final phase of the multiyear tree-planting project in Valley Park, the 40-acre parcel of town-owned land situated between Valley Road and High Street, with the planting of 65 of the more than 330 trees that have been set in the park since 2015.

The “valley,” as it is sometimes referred, has been transformed in recent years by the town, with a trail system established after some uncertainty about what to do with the land after the discovery of residual agricultural and industrial chemicals from its past use as farmland.

“We’ve planted close to 70 species of trees [in Valley Park],” said Karen Day, chair of the Tree Commission. “That area [historically] grew ornamental trees. So, in a way this is bringing it full circle.”

Thanks to the commission’s efforts, the Arbor Day Foundation, the national nonprofit organization dedicated to tree conservation and education, awarded the town Tree City status. To meet the requirement for this designation, applicants have to document total spending equal to $2 per resident in the year they are applying.

Newport and Portsmouth secured

Tree City status years ago, and Day said that Middletown is proud to join their Aquidneck Island neighbors. “There may have been some tree city envy,” she said.

The commission was formed in the wake of Hurricane Bob, which devastated Aquidneck Island in 1991. The six-person group meets monthly and gives advisory opinions to the Middletown Planning Board regarding landscape plans within development proposals.

The recognition coincides with Middletown’s tree-planting incentive program that is celebrating its 10th year. The program allows Middletown residents to receive a $50 discount once per year on the purchase of a deciduous tree from Chaves Garden Center, Boulevard Nurseries or Moore Blooms Garden Center. The vendors are then reimbursed through the program, which is funded by a yearly appropriation from the Town Council and grants from various organizations.

“We’ve done over 900 trees this way. They’ve been planted on private property,” said Day, describing the initiative as win-win for both the environment and the beautification of Middletown. “This was our big focus. We can plant trees on public land, but obviously we can’t go into someone’s yard and plant a tree because we think it would look lovely there.”

John Bollard, incoming Middletown Rotary Club president, has led the group’s focus on local environmental initiatives. “There was a request for the local chapters to get involved with something along these [sustainability] lines,” he said. “So, this is what we selected.”

Bollard added that the Rotary plans to continue an annual gift to the commission. There will also be a volunteer clean-up day at Valley Park at 10 a.m. on April 27.

“They’ve spent a lot of this money for these plantings … this is another way to support the valley,” he said.

Past funding has also been provided by the van Beuren Charitable Foundation, the Alice B. Mayer Trust, the Rhode Island Foundation, Aquidneck Land Trust, the Newport Horticultural Society and the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management.

The reimbursement program was initially sparked by the 2008 recession, said Day, which hampered small business, and the decades long effort to create a counterbalance to the development boom that the town has experienced, which often includes the removal of trees and other vegetation.

“Landscaping was not a priority and wasn’t required [by zoning] at the time,” said Day.

She credited the commission’s first chairman, Paul LaMond, who passed away in 2014, with getting the first ordinance passed, establishing the tree commission and requiring landscaping elements to new development projects. “Paul started a great initiative and, unfortunately, he’s not able to see all of his hard work that is coming to a head.”

Planning Board member B.J. Owen, who has served as the board’s liaison to the tree commission for about a decade, praised the dedication of its members. “We have members who go out at all hours of the evening to check to make certain that deer are not nibbling at the newly planted trees,” she said.

The commission have overseen the planting of more than 1,200 trees along Middletown’s streets in the past 25 years, in addition to the ones planted on private property through the incentive program.

Day said the next step will be establishing a fund for continued maintenance. Seed money was recently secured from the Mayer Trust, whose $6,000 donation opened the door to matching funds from the van Beuren Foundation. “Thinking long-term,” she said. “We’re not looking to just stick them in the ground and hope for the best.”

Owen also made the connection between Valley Park’s heritage when owned by the Kempenaar family, before being sold to the town in 2004, and its revival.

“It was one of the biggest nurseries in New England at one time,” she said. “[All the way] to the area surrounding Shaw’s [on East Main Road] and the post office. That was all part of the nursery.”

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