Sustainable what?

The University has agreed to plant “sustainable trees” around campus

Thanks, Select Trees Group, for giving us $1 million worth of trees – with a $255,000 price tag attached.

But alas, these trees are not just any old oak, maple or evergreen.

They are sustainable. Sustainable… trees.

Aren’t all trees – by the nature of their makeup and function – sustainable?

Select Trees Group urges that its super-trees “build legacies” because they are tougher, taller and stronger.

We certainly agree that they are the trendiest trees on the block. Surely the first kind ever to vie for LEED certification.

But what, really, sets them apart?

Needing only soil, sunshine and water, they live and they grow; provide shade free of cost; and turn carbon dioxide into fresh oxygen.

Is this a joke? The heck with canopies of shade, we have a $16.7 million hole in our budget.

In its pitch to the University, the Group actually quantified the value of a tree, telling the Physical Plant that its trees “provide over $162,250 in environmental benefits over a 50-year period.”

Sounds nice, but here’s the catch – it will cost the University $800 to $900 to plant each of the 300 trees donated. So the University just tagged that bill on the Physical Plant, which has already cut over $1 million from its budget in the last fiscal year.

But – gasp – can “green” really be wrong?

For the sake of our furloughed teachers, cuts in our graduate students’ health coverage, reductions in our course offerings and everything else affected by the University’s hurting budget, we think so.

Students, faculty and staff – say no to sustainable trees.

- Hayley Peterson for the editorial board