DISTRICT OF WEST VANCOUVER
District and West Vancouver Schools Partner to Plant Trees and Promote Environmental Stewardship

This fall, the District is teaming up with West Vancouver Schools to enhance the community's urban forest as part of the Urban Forest Management Plan (UFMP). Over the coming weeks, District Climate Action & Environment staff, along with students and teachers from 11 primary, elementary, and secondary West Vancouver Schools, will plant over 50 trees in carefully selected locations on school grounds.

Students will participate in the tree planting and on-going care and maintenance of the trees to foster a sense of ownership, environmental awareness, and teamwork. In addition to planting and maintenance, students will learn about the importance of trees, environmental stewardship, and the role trees play in improving air quality, preserving biodiversity, and mitigating climate change. The planting project will empower students, reinforce schools as leaders in sustainable education, and ensure that our urban forest continues to provide important benefits to the community.

The initiative also reinforces schools as leaders in sustainable education and helps to ensure that our urban forest continues to offer essential environmental and social benefits.

Urban Forest Management Plan (UFMP)

The UFMP provides a 15-year vision for the management of the urban forest, with strategies and actions to achieve a recommended 52% canopy cover target in the municipality. Achieving this target will require sustained effort from the District and community to retain existing trees whenever possible and to plant new ones to replace trees lost due to changes in land use, climate, and forest health issues. Actions such as bylaw changes to minimize tree removals during redevelopment, implementing increased replanting and planting requirements for tree removals, and introducing a voluntary tree planting program in the community, are examples of actions to achieve the canopy cover target. Efforts to retain existing trees and plant new ones are critical to offset the impacts of climate change, land development, and other environmental pressures.

The UFMP recommends actions to develop an annual planting program and support private property tree planting. By working together with schools to identify locations suitable for trees, the District aims to enhance the urban forest that will benefit generations to come.

Learn more about the Urban Forest Management Plan at westvancouver.ca/forest.