For the 17th year, American Forests is helping communities around the world restore tree cover through its Global ReLeaf Forests program. One million trees will be planted in projects ranging from Malaysian orangutan forest and Mexican monarch habitat to urban communities along an expressway in Illinois and eagle habitat near Denver.

Here's a look at what some of your Global ReLeaf dollars can plant this year. For a complete list, visit www.americanforests.org; every dollar plants a tree.

• In Alabama's Talladega National Forest, 48,000 longleaf pine to restore a healthy ecosystem for endangered red-cockaded woodpecker.
• In California, 169,000 trees in burned areas of Eldorado National Forest to restore 10 spotted owl protected activity centers and two northern goshawk sites.
• In Colorado, restore water quality at a Denver watershed, home to bald eagle winter roost sites.
• In Illinois, restore Emiquon Preserve, a pre-European-settlement landscape of backwater lakes, wetlands, and forests virtually unmatched in the Midwest. Also, make the drive more palatable-and life nearby cleaner and quieter-by planting conifers along Elgin-O'Hare Expressway.
• Continue restoration at Maryland's unique Cranesville Swamp Preserve (see page 26).
• In Oregon, 55,000 ponderosa pine and western larch to provide winter habitat for elk in Umatilla National Forest.
• In Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, revert about 20 wooded acres overrun by invasive plants back into native hardwood forest.
• Continue reforestation of Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge in Texas, considered one of the continental U.S.'s most biologically diverse national wildlife refuges (see South Texas Eco-Wonderland, Winter 2004).
• Reestablish native northern red and white oak to a 2,000+-acre state wildlife and natural area near Madison, Wisconsin, used for hiking, fishing, and cross-country skiing.
• Plant 3,000 red spruce to protect at-risk species on West Virginia's Spruce Mountain, which has seen its namesake trees dwindle due to land uses.
• In Indonesia, 42,000 trees to begin restoration of degraded forest and coastal areas hard hit by logging, fires, and natural disasters, most notably the 2004 earthquake and resulting tsunami.
• In Malaysia, restore degraded forest within Supu Forest Reserve along the Kinabatangan River, one of the single largest remaining natural forest habitats for the endangered orangutan, storms stork, Borneon bristlehead, and other rare endemic species such as the proboscis monkey and Borneon gibbon.
• Plant 40,000 trees in south-central Mexico to improve monarch butterfly winter nesting sites.
• Support forest stewards from Tabuk, in the Philippines, in the planting of 25,000 native trees to begin the restoration and renewal of Agbannawag watershed and surrounding former forest areas. AF

Clif Bar goes Global

Clif Bar is thinking about global warming. So much so, in fact, that the health snack company this winter launched a nationwide campaign to help ski resorts, skiers, and snowboarders combat global warming, which threatens to reduce snowfall and jeopardize winter sports for years to come.

Clif Bar is planting trees on behalf of ski resorts that apply for the prestigious Golden Eagle Awards for Environmental Excellence, which recognize environmental achievements by ski areas. The awards are sponsored by Clif Bar & Co., the National Ski Areas Association (NSAA), and the Natural Resources Defense Council. Clif Bar is also planting 10 trees in a Global ReLeaf Forest on behalf of each of the first 25 applicants.

This is in addition to Clif Bar's ongoing Cool Commute program, which plants Global ReLeaf Forest trees to offset the "climate footprint" of its employees' commutes. In the past three years, that effort has planted more than 8,000 trees.

Scientists predict global warming will diminish snow pack in the western United States by up to 70 percent in the coastal mountains over the next 50 years. Studies also forecast that Rocky Mountains ski resorts will be all but shut down by 2050 if global warming continues at its current rate.

The awards will be presented at the NSAA convention in May. To learn more about Clif Bar's environmental programs: www.clifbar.com/environment

Savvy Schools

North Carolina teachers are going back to the classroom to learn hands-on computer skills to help them teach about the environment. Nine teachers from four central North Carolina schools participated in a day-long GIS/CITYgreen workshop at Catawba College's Center for the Environment. The workshop introduced teachers to American Forests' Geographic Information Systems environmental education program, which gives students real-world learning experience and teachers an innovative, well-organized curriculum for teaching science, math, and GIS.

Sponsored by The Dale Earnhart Foundation, this was the first of five GIS environmental education workshops to be held this year in central North Carolina.

Using lesson plans as a guide, teachers learned how to create landcover data by digitally drawing the trees in their study site from an aerial photo base map of the Catawba Campus. The teachers then headed outside to perform a tree inventory, learning proper techniques for identifying trees, calculating height and trunk diameter, and determining tree health and growing conditions.

The collected field data was then entered into tree attribute tables and CITYgreen software used to run models that calculated the trees' ecological and economic benefits. Using CITYgreen's growth model, teachers "grew" the trees over a 25-year period to investigate their long-term benefits. Lesson plans help teachers and administrators bring technology into the classroom, educating students in core academic subjects and providing real-world applications for conservation and urban planning.

For information about American Forests' CITYgreen environmental education program, visit: here.-Eric Ray

Washington Outlook

Like last year, President Bush's FY 2007 budget proposal for the Forest Service suggests bad news for programs that support forest restoration through collaborative efforts between the agency and communities. Many programs American Forests and our community-based forestry partners consider priorities are proposed for cuts or elimination.

Ironically, many of our priority strategies-collaboration, forest restoration, and protecting open space through markets for ecosystem services-are featured among the President's as well. However, the Administration interprets those strategies and translates them into program budgets far differently than we would.

In fact, two major proposals among the Administration's strategy to expand collaborative efforts, we believe, would do more harm than good to current Forest Service efforts toward collaborative forest restoration.

One of these would increase Northwest Forest Plan funding by $65 million so the Forest Service can sell 800 million board-feet of timber in 2007. To support this increase, the President would hike the Forest Products program by $30 million and give the Northwest a greater portion of the agency's program funding-mostly from National Forest System programs but also from Hazardous Fuels Reduction and Capital Improvement and Maintenance for roads. This emphasis on achieving a timber target, we fear, will create new conflict among diverse interest groups in the Northwest, stalling or negating progress recently made through collaborative efforts focused on forest restoration. It also will cause resentment and controversy in those regions whose funding was reduced.

The other proposal would sell parcels of land within the National Forest System to help raise $800 million to fund a five-year extension of the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000 (Public Law 106-393). This Act-in particular its Title II, which established local Resource Advisory Committees-has been one of the most important and promising pieces of legislation over the last decade for developing place-based, collaborative forest restoration projects on federal lands.

Selling increasingly valuable, long-term assets to pay for short-term, one-time operational costs is shortsighted and irresponsible. We believe that Congress should reauthorize and fund the legislation for another seven years, as proposed last year in bipartisan legislation by senators Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Larry Craig (R-ID).

We would also suggest Congress consider how local Resource Advisory Committees could encourage practical experiments to develop future revenue streams-such as payments for ecosystem services--to help support place-based, collaborative forest-restoration projects.

The Administration's 2007 budget is presented against a backdrop of political priorities: the war on terror, strengthening homeland defense, and economic recovery, and the Forest Service budget seeks to do more with less, as summed-up in this statement:

"The Forest Service must therefore use collaborative approaches and operate with renewed efficiency in order to reduce costs while accomplishing its mission."

On one hand, it is good to have the Administration prominently recognize the importance of collaborating with other federal agencies, state and local governments, and nongovernmental organizations. President Bush's August 2004 Executive Order on Cooperative Conservation, followed a year later by a White House Conference on the same topic, has elevated collaboration as a central tenet of the Administration's policy direction for the Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, and other federal agencies involved in land conservation. This federal focus is an important achievement for those of us who have been advocating for collaborative approaches over the last decade.

With the Administration's major emphases on efficiency and cost-reduction, however, it seems collaboration is being interpreted narrowly. The Administration's tendency seems to be to treat collaboration as cost-reduction by letting the private sector or state and local governments take on more financial responsibility for activities such as assistance to communities and nonfederal forest landowners, community fire protection, and rural development.

American Forests encourages collaboration that focuses on building understanding and trust among diverse agencies and organizations. We support developing plans and projects on which they can work together, implementing projects in ways that both use current capacity and build new capacity among public and private partner organizations, and monitoring the results for accountability and adaptive learning. Many of the Forest Service programs that we believe are central to this type of collaborative work have been hit hard in the President's FY 2007 budget proposal.

The agency's State and Private Forestry (S&PF) programs take the greatest cuts on a percentage basis, down 12.5 percent, or $35 million, from last year's S&PF budget. By definition, S&PF programs are those through which the Forest Service cooperates with other entities, including private for-profits and not-for-profits, as well as other governments in the U.S. and internationally.

S&PF programs are cut across the board; the only exception is the Forest Legacy Program, which received a $5 million increase to $61.5 million. American Forests supports the proposed increase for Forest Legacy, which provides funds for acquiring easements on nonfederal forests threatened by conversion to nonforest uses. We encourage Congress to restore funding for S&PF programs the President's budget would cut or eliminate. (See AF's testimony on the President's FY 2007 budget proposals on our website.) The President's proposals would completely eliminate the Economic Action Program ($9.5 million) and the Forest Resource Information and Analysis Program ($4.6 million). Other reductions: $12.5 million in Forest Health;

$6 million in State Fire Assistance and Volunteer Fire Assistance; $1.6 million in Urban and Community Forestry; and $.3 million in Forest Stewardship.

Wildland Fire Management also is targeted for cuts in programs that support collaboration with rural communities on wildfire protection. Most importantly, more than 40 percent ($16.7 million) would be cut from the State Fire Assistance program, which provides critical support for Community Wildfire Protection Plan--the key mechanism for local collaboration in identifying and designing projects to reduce hazardous fuels around communities.

American Forests continues to encourage strong funding for the Hazardous Fuels Reduction Program, and therefore, supports the President's proposal to increase funding to $292 million. We are concerned, however, that the agency's emphasis on efficiency seems to translate into efforts to treat the most acres at the least cost. That ignores the need to support local collaboration in identifying the highest priority acres, the best treatment methods, and how to provide opportunities for local businesses and workers through these projects.

Another concern is a significant reduction for Rehabilitation and Restoration, which would leave the program with only $2 million. Five years ago Congress gave this program $142 million to help achieve critical post-wildfire objectives, such as dealing with invasive species and encouraging reforestation through tree planting or natural regeneration, as well as the larger National Fire Plan goal of restoring fire-adapted ecosystems. Since then, however, the Administration has consistently requested little or no funding for it; Congress has restored some funding each year but in ever smaller amounts.-Gerry Gray

Hurricane Plantings with Oprah's Angel Network

Over the years, American Forests has worked with Habitat for Humanity projects, providing energy-saving trees that will help cool homes built by the nonprofit for those in need. This time the partnership was in Houston, where American Forests worked with Trees for Houston, planting trees in a new subdivision in Glen Iris.

The money to build these homes came from a personal donation by Oprah Winfrey. Using some of the donations made to her public charity, Oprah's Angel Network, American Forests was able to plant three large trees around each home.

This special subdivision will be home to 65 families displaced last summer when Hurricanes Katrina and Rita struck the Gulf Coast, killing people, destroying homes, and uprooting trees. The storms also uprooted the sense of community that familiar surroundings-like trees-provide. For more information about Oprah's Angel Network Katrina Home Registry, visit www.oprah.com/katrinahomes.

Trees Online

What do McDonald's Corporation, The Coca-Cola Company, and Cincinnati Bell, Inc. have in common with American Forests? They've joined American Forests partner Computershare, the world's largest stock transfer agent, to plant trees while reducing paper consumption through e-delivery of shareholder materials.

Called eTree, the Computershare program contributes to environmental health by reducing costs associated with printing and mailing shareholder materials. When one of those companies' shareholders registers for the eTree program he or she receives shareholder materials via e-mail and has a tree planted in an American Forests' Global ReLeaf Forest as a thank you.

To date, more than 1.2 million trees have been planted in the U.S., Canada, the United Kingdom, and Australia through the eTree program, and more than 500,000 shareholders have agreed to receive shareholder materials online. The goal of eTree USA is to plant an additional 500,000 trees by the end of 2006. To learn more and help reach that goal, visit http://www.etreeusa.com.