WRPA 2018 Annual Conference and Tradeshow

"Cultivating Resilient Communities"

 


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Date/Time: Wednesday, May 2 | 3:00 - 4:15PM

Moderator: Ben Thompson, Washington State Department of Natural Resources

Category: Risk Management

Description: Community trees, parks, and green spaces provide tremendous benefits while negative impacts on these public assets have consequences for the safety, health, and welfare of communities. In addition to being a recreational amenity, public parks provide critical ecosystem services such as stormwater mitigation, air pollution abatement, shading and cooling, noise attenuation, wildlife habitat, and beautification. Learn management strategies to improve the resilience of community trees, parks and welfare by resisting, withstanding and recovering from storms and other landscape-scale threats. We will explore how community-wide stewardship from citizens, volunteers, and non-profits of parks and natural resources can help promote a broader sense of environmental, economic and social resilience.

Learning Objectives:

  • Understand how the presence of trees and other vegetation in city parks is intimately connected to human health and welfare.

  • Learn practical, common-sense strategies that can be implemented to maximize benefits, minimize risks, and control costs associated with vegetation in parks.

  • Discover how citizens, volunteers, non-profits and other
    organizations can contribute to the resilience of public parks and green spaces in advance of the next landscape-scale disturbance.

Speaker: Ben holds a Master's of Science degree in Forest Resources and Conservation from the University of Florida where he studied the impacts of hurricanes on urban forests of the Southeastern U.S. Ben is an ISA Certified Arborist and former City Arborist for the City of Falls Church, Virginia, where he was responsible for the care and management of vegetation on public property. Currently Ben lives in Olympia where he and his family enjoy frequent access to the city's many parks and recreational trails.

 Session Approved for .1 CEU Credits

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