FC Named 'Tree City USA' for 26th Time

In advance of this year's celebration of Arbor Day April 16, the National Arbor Day Foundation announced this week that the City of Falls Church has been awarded its 26th consecutive annual Tree City USA designation, making it the only jurisdiction in Virginia to accomplish this. Falls Church also received its second Growth Award designation that recognizes environmental improvement and encouragement of high levels of tree care.

To qualify for a Tree City USA designation, jurisdictions must meet five standards that include having (1) a viable tree management plan and program, (2) an Arbor Day observance, (3) a tree care ordinance, (4) a tree board or commission and (5) a budget with a line item for tree care.

This year, Falls Church went an extra step this past year by implementing a computerized tree inventory of all its publicly maintained trees, linking it to the GIS computerized mapping system.

Falls Church has celebrated Arbor Day on the third Friday in April since 1892 when the Falls Church Village Improvement Society invited Dr. B.G. Northrup of Connecticut to give a speech in the building that is now the Washington House adjacent the State Theatre.

Dr. Northrup proposed that the City inaugurate an Arbor Day in April to include the school children in an effort to replace the Madison public school yard, currently Frady Park, that had been destroyed by a powerful storm.

To this day, trees are planted each April on all of the City's public school grounds. In recent years, a public celebration has also been added on Saturdays for working families and to utilize the historic setting of Frady Park for annual reenactments of the first Arbor Day 112 years ago.