On September 14th, the US Forest Service announced $1 billion being allocated to make trees more readily available to people. As discovered by an investigation from the Dailly Caller News Foundation (DCNF), $101,096,371 was being funneled through 17 different grant proposals across the US. Targeted to pay for “tree equity” to be restored, the term is a liberal catchphrase calling a lack of trees in the inner city because of “redlining and other discriminatory policies,” says the US Forest Service.
As part of their reasoning behind this, the US Forest Service believes that planting trees will suddenly reduce crime as well as make people healthier. Naturally, Biden is paying for this through his mis-titled climate bill, the Inflation Reduction Act.
One city taking a big share of the grant money is Atlanta, GA. Already blanketed with trees over nearly half the city, they believe the $10 million will help make things more fair across the city, and they can hire more minority tree workers. San Francisco, CA, had neatly 15k trees per square mile as of 2021, yet they got $14 million to plant more trees throughout 2023.
In total, the US Forest Service is spreading the $1 billion across 385 grants that were written with the idea of making America a greener nation. The full funding of this initiative is aimed at what they termed “disadvantaged communities.” Shockingly the Oregon Department of Forestry received one of the largest grants. Worth $22,857,196, the grant utilizes “Indigenous ecological knowledge” for training people in planting, monitoring, and keeping the trees maintained. A grant bestowed on the Ebiil Society for $740k will use the same information to teach people about trees as well.
Not being left out, Aurora, Colorado and their Department of Parks, Recreation and Open Space received $5,000,000 to plant trees in “high immigrant and refugee populations.” Never mind how packed the entire city and state are with trees, this program has been handing over money hand over fist to spread different ways of agriculture.
The DCNF spoke with the US Forest Service about this kind of money being spread around and paying out so much so quickly. “Urban and Community Forestry is a covered program under the Agency’s Justice40 Initiative established through Executive Order 13985. To advance the mission of Justice40, the UCF program delivers 40% of the program’s investments through established and new partnerships working to support disadvantaged communities experiencing low tree canopy and environmental justice issues.”
Coming out with the idea that trees are causing racial problems or that a lack of forestation of the inner city is responsible for crime. Grants like this have historically led to trees being planted that are only destroyed by the kids they were planted to appease. The maintenance of these projects rarely happens, and when it does, it’s not looked after by the community like it was intended to be.
The fact of the matter is that trees aren’t racist in any manner. They aren’t planted in racist ways. Rather, they are planted where people leave land undeveloped so others can enjoy them. If minority-dominated areas want to see more trees growing around them, they need to find space to plant them. They need to tend to them and make sure the next generation knows to respect them. Not breaking the branches on them, digging them up to hide drugs under, or carving them up to try and tag a gang territory.
Playing the race card in every situation and over any little disagreement is not in keeping with the American way of life. Instead, as Americans, we should be pulling our own weight and making the changes we want to see in our nation. Grants like this need to be evenly applied and not earmarked for organizations and areas based on race. Keep to the numbers and the facts, not playing to the liberal idea of race meaning everything.
