Trees For Our Children

Ok, I can understand how planting a tree helps the environment, but why plant trees in a cemetery? What’s so special in that?

Good question! Trees planted in cemeteries are safest for three reasons.

1. Cemetery land is only profitable when it’s undeveloped.

Cemeteries are resting places for our dead. They can’t remain that way if we build highway exit ramps, shopping malls, or an apartment complexes on them. Cemeteries need to remain green and verdant. The nicer, greener, and more verdant the cemetery grounds, the more business that cemetery can attract.

2. Cemeteries are safest from eminent domain land grabs.

Just recently the State of Michigan attempted a land grab on the Chapel Hill cemetery in southern Michigan for the purpose of building a highway exit ramp. It was soundly defeated though because people didn’t like the idea of a thousand cars driving through their mom and dads grave. I don’t either! Nobody I know does. It’s very hard politically to convince people to dishonor our loved ones that have passed on.

3. Cemeteries have large trust funds for the care of their grounds, including the trees.

Ten percent of all sales in a cemetery are put into a trust fund by law. When a cemetery has sold all of its grave plots the interest from the trust fund is used to continue to maintain the cemetery. The cemetery basically retires, and lives off the interest to pay a grounds crew to cut the grass, and care for the trees and buildings. It’s really a beautiful system, and I wish we used it with our taxes!

I hope you now realize the advantages of partnering with cemeteries for reforestation. Cemeteries love to partner with us because they get a “free” tree in effect to help with their landscaping, drainage, and soil erosion.

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—Heston Glenn

In case you havent heard, March 31st (Monday) is Earth Hour!  Where for one hour people are encouraged to turn off all of their energy consumption and give the planet a much needed break!  The staff at Trees For Our Children hope that all of our readers will embrace this opportunity to add a positive change to our planet!

Our staff will be taking part in Earth Hour next week!  We look forward to bringing you those stories and hope that you will add some of your own!

—Tony Mantova

This is the official blog of “Trees For Our Children,” home of a loose network of environmental activists that are teaming up with cemetery owners to plant trees, grow forests and ultimately help reduce greenhouse gases and reforest North America!

We want to encourage everyone to contribute to the friendly and diverse discussion as we offer perspectives about the trees we plant and how they like their new habitat, talk about the need to raise awareness for the environment, and even what personal choices you can take to make your part of this planet just a little bit greener!

We ask you to respect other people’s opinions, speak your mind, and above all, have fun!

So please be patient as we work behind the scenes to set up our official website! We encourage everyone to enjoy our blog in the meantime! Right now we are making improvements and getting ready to sell trees for what is promising to be an exciting year!

—Tony Mantova