News Flash

Village of Westmont
Date Issued: December 22, 2017

In the fall of 2017, the Westmont Environmental Improvement Commission (EIC) brought forth a recommendation to the Village Board to create a Heritage Tree Ordinance.  A Heritage Tree is defined as those tree species identified as having significant importance to the village at their respective size class.

“Trees are not only extremely important to our ecosystem, but they also contain information about our history,” said Westmont Village Forester Jon Yeater, who is also the EIC Liaison.  “We recently found a tree of record proportions within the Village, and are working to verify its uniqueness, possibly being a National Champion-sized tree. The Heritage Tree ordinance helps protect trees like this in our community.”

The ordinance fulfills one of the Village’s Strategic Plan initiatives - Honor the natural environment and encourage green initiatives and sustainable building practices.

The goals of the ordinance include:
? Education about the value of trees to the community
? Tree conservation
? Support of local habitat
? Natural area protection for the future
? Preservation of mature urban canopy and their many benefits
? Promoting a positive impact on air/soil quality & watershed
? Incentives to include trees in design rather than tree removal
? Excluding ‘weed’ species

EIC PROMOTES TREE CARE
“Though it’s winter, we are already planning for the spring,” said EIC volunteer Glenn Gabryel.  “We plan to put out a series of informational posts about the importance of trees and tree care practices.  It may be surprising to learn that some popular landscaping techniques may be considered attractive, but are actually harmful for trees.”

Look for more tree care information to come out in the April issue of Neighbors Magazine and on the Village Website.  For more information about tree care and the Environmental Improvement Commission, contact Jon Yeater at jyeater@westmont.il.gov.