Branching out for the better

The wait is over. The promise is fulfilled. The Township of West Orange delivered and planted a baby maple on our lawn.

Actually I missed the big event — or rather the smallish event, since the sapling I received several months ago showed more promise than girth or height. I was running errands, and by the time I returned home, two nursery workers had already dug the hole, placed the stock, installed stakes and guy wires, tied a bamboo support to the trunk (describing it this way is a stretch), attached a protective mesh sleeve, and added wood chips as ground cover.

I thanked them for their efforts and noticed that they also planted several lollipop-looking saplings along the fence of my neighbor’s property. Then I drove down our cul-de-sac at the crest of Second Orange Mountain and counted three more wood chip mounds with no visible trunk support and mop-tops of leaves. Later, when I ventured out again, I tallied nearly two dozen new trees on the street leading up to our home, and on one several blocks over.

Both roads were given infrastructure and repaving makeovers last fall; during that work, a significant number of mature oaks, maples, and firs designated as diseased, dying, or reconstruction obstacles were felled. Our street also had been designated for improvements but fortunately escaped a chain-saw massacre before crews added new curbing and sewers and rolled out a rut-free roadway.

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While I’m pleased with the result, I only hope it signals the start of West Orange’s effort to raise its municipal tree canopy above the current lackluster 33 percent — a result largely fueled by breakneck development — and nudge it back to a healthier 40 percent. And I say this with the concurrence of town forester Walter Kipp, who has quoted these figures and even hopes once again to reach the 50 percent canopy that was in place before Superstorm Sandy wrought its destruction.

In a March letter advising residents of their imminent sapling deliveries, Mr. Kipp cited the township’s “aging and depleted urban forest” and “the need to sustain a substantial … canopy coverage, and the many other benefits trees provide.… Our department is proceeding with a proactive revitalization program.”

Last year, the forester planted a mix of 650 oaks, maples, Princeton elms, dogwoods, hawthorns, crabapples, and other ornamentals. Of those, about 250 resulted from losses during road milling and sidewalk rebuilding. Mr. Kipp says he has identified 330 locations for plantings this year, adding to the thousands of trees already in the town’s inventory.

When we chatted recently, Mr. Kipp seemed determined to recapture the 50 percent pre-Sandy benchmark. But West Orange’s financial outlook may limit his effort, as the township faces a fiscal reckoning brought on by questionable development decisions, heavy municipal debt, and a just-completed revaluation. Yet the forester says he is hopeful about future funding and the impact of a new, toughened municipal tree replacement ordinance.

With everything else going on in the world, it seems rather self-indulgent, naïve, or trivial to dwell on this subject. Surely there are more serious issues to address. Apologies aside, when I gaze at my landscape over morning coffee (ignoring for the moment the “tribute” exacted by deer) or when I’m caught in glutinous Jersey traffic, I spot locations where I think an oak here, a ginkgo there, perhaps a weeping willow over yonder should be planted. Suddenly, my fixations with global calamities or the slowpoke driving in front of me seem to vanish.

My thoughts invariably turn greener at this time of the year, as summer ripens with heat and humidity, and fall, my favorite season, remains a slightly distant prospect, even though some brittle brown leaves already have fallen. August is a generally parched month, forcing trees and shrubs to drive their roots deeper in search of precious moisture and wilt their leaves as a protective shield. I’ll certainly need to keep our new sapling adequately hydrated as it establishes its first year of residency on our lawn.

Trees possess the virtues of being nonpolarizing, nonbinary, and nonpolitical (except to developers and zoners). All streams of the tribe can agree that they beautify and help cleanse the environment, whether in northern New Jersey or southern Israel. Trees amplify the very Jewish values of reverence for the land we till, the air we breathe, and the water we drink. The Tanach speaks of their importance metaphorically and symbolically, from the Tree of Life to the Cedars of Lebanon, the beams of Noah’s ark, the singular olive branch, and on through the Oaks of Righteousness.

My concern about trees isn’t rooted in some biospheric vision of doom but rather in the immediate threat they face on my home turf of West Orange. Several large and contentious development projects are in the pipeline, being debated, or just completed. These include a proposal to clear-cut a swath for the West Essex Highlands mega-complex, putting more than 6,000 trees at risk, according to some estimates, if the long-argued plans finally go through.

Then there is PSE&G’s bid to bring down several stately London planes and small-leaf lindens at its substation to expedite an expansion. A watchdog organization, Our Green West Orange, is negotiating with the utility now to limit the loss. Additionally, two fast-food chains are applying for variances to open on a lot just outside Eagle Rock Reservation. It is directly across the street from once-elegant Mayfair Farms, also targeted for a big development that has been blocked for now but may go forward as part of “builder’s remedy” litigation.

West Orange has absorbed more than its share of growth lately. It is now home to a half-dozen assisted living or nursing facilities, with another one poised to begin operation. A new and sprawling apartment complex that overwhelms the downslope of First Orange Mountain has begun renting, while the Edison battery factory, repurposed into lofts and stores nearly a decade ago, with West Orange heavily involved in the financing, still seeks tenants and businesses. And just recently, a garish self-storage facility wedged into the base of Second Mountain opened, giving motorists an in-your-windshield eyesore and a trickier intersection to navigate.

What all this means is that besides losing its tree canopy, something Mr. Kipp estimates will occur at the rate of 3 percent a year if left unchecked, the town also is surrendering its suburban character in a frenzied pursuit of ratables that so far has failed to stabilize taxes.

But back to my new maple. At 83, I doubt that I’ll be around to see it reach full maturity. However, in just a few months it has flexed a bit, puffed fuller, and caught the attention of neighborhood birds. Call it paying it forward, but I’m glad the future owner of the house will benefit from its beauty. I just hope the township will see the benefit of both the forest and the trees.

Jonathan E. Lazarus, a retired editor of The Star-Ledger, edits copy for the Jewish Standard/New Jersey Jewish News when he is not weeding the garden or losing his ongoing battle against hosta-eating deer.