Environmental Protection and Sustainability
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Program Implementation

Urban Greening, Planting Trees, and Reforestation

EPS administers several programs to encourage citizens and community organizations to plant trees to enhance environmental quality and community quality of life.

Tree-Mendous Maryland Program – Each spring and fall, EPS promotes this Maryland Department of Natural Resources program that provides low-cost trees to organizations for planting on public lands and community open spaces. EPS provides the current order form and list of available trees and shrubs. EPS also provides free delivery of trees for community orders of 10 or more trees. Learn more about how to order your community trees.

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Rural Reforestation

The ecological and economic sustainability of the forest resources of Baltimore County depends to a large degree on the stewardship ethic of private landowners, who own and mange 75 percent of the forests in the County. EPS has developed several programs to educate landowners about their role as forest stewards and to encourage and provide incentives to landowners to increase forest cover, particularly on rural residential land. The following are current and completed rural reforestation projects:

Rural Residential Stewardship Initiative

EPS received a $27,200 grant, funded by the US Environmental Protection Agency and administered by the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, under the 2004 Chesapeake Bay Small Watershed Grants program, to develop and pilot a project to educate smaller-lot (3-6 acres or so) rural residential landowners about their role as "managers" of common forest and stream systems and to increase forest area along streams and adjacent to existing forests.

The project resulted in the addition of 17 acres of new forest on 12 residential lots in two R.C.4 subdivisions in the Loch Raven Reservoir watershed. Project information available includes the two project Stewardship Plans (PDF) and Caring for Your Reforestation: A Landowner’s Guide to Reforestation Project Maintenance (PDF).

Community Reforestation Program

Development projects in Baltimore County must comply with the Forest Conservation Act, enacted by the County Council in 1992 as required by the Maryland Forest Conservation Act of 1991. For some projects, developers are permitted to pay a fee in-lieu of mitigation for required reforestation. EPS uses these fees to reforest open lands being committed by agencies to return to forest cover, including State and County lands.

A four person reforestation crew works year-round to plant, monitor, and maintain reforestation projects and to manage a small tree nursery that helps provide a variety of tree species and sizes. More than 125 acres have been planted since inception of the program in both urban and rural areas of the County.

In addition to planting public lands, EPS is able to reforest private lands where the landowner is willing to record an easement in the Land Records reserving the area for forest cover in perpetuity, as well as willingness to approve an Entry Agreement allowing EPS staff to enter the property, with notification of the landowner, for the purpose of planting, monitoring, and maintaining the reforestation area.

All costs of equipment, reforestation materials, and labor are paid for by the developers’ mitigation fund. Landowners interested in becoming a candidate for reforestation should contact EPS at 410-887-4488, x242.

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Forest Assessment and Monitoring

The foundation for good resource management is adequate dialogue among stakeholders who are informed by relevant data and analysis. Although not necessarily a linear process, better data should lead to better dialogue, which should lead to better decisions. The Department of Environmental Protection and Sustainability (EPS) conducts periodic assessments and monitoring regarding the condition and trends for its forest resources in order to inform dialogue and decisions. The following are descriptions and documents for existing programs and projects under development.

  • 2007 State of Our Forests Report -  In December 2007 Baltimore County released its first State of Our Forests report (17MB)(PDF) to summarize existing County, State, Federal and other data that characterize the ecological and economic sustainability of the County's forest resources, using the Montreal Process Criteria and Indicators framework.
  • Forest Assessment and Monitoring Framework - This February 2007 Forest Assessment and Monitoring Framework (PDF) poster presents the relationship between EPS’s forest assessment and monitoring program to the Montreal Process Criteria and Indicators framework, as well as the potential use of data for various management programs and other decision-making applications in Baltimore County.
  • Oregon Ridge Park Forest Health Assessment and Forest Management Plan - This April 2007 consultant report provides an assessment of forest health for 22 forest stands for the 895 acres of forest in the Park, using the USDA Forest Service North East Decision (NED) model, as well as an assessment of trail and stream conditions. Forest management recommendations are provided for the objective of assuring the natural regeneration of the Park’s oak-dominated forest.

Note - The following PDFs are very large and could take several minutes to download with a high-speed Internet connection. All PDFs open in a new window.

For more information about the plan please e-mail Don Outen at douten@baltimorecountymd.gov.

  • Forest Conservation Typology - EPS developed Forest Conservation Typology Map (PDF) a County-wide GIS-based typology in 2007 of the protection and conservation status of forest cover. The typology was developed as an example of how the vulnerability of forests to conversion to non-forest cover might be evaluated at the local level.
    • This analysis was prepared for discussion at the Maryland Forest Conservation Goals workgroup facilitated by the Maryland Department of Natural Resources, in response to the Chesapeake Bay Program’s Executive Council Directive 06-1 (PDF), “Protecting the Forests of the Chesapeake Watershed.”
    • The map and data table suggest that, in addition to the more than 55,000 acres or 41 percent of forest cover that is protected through public ownership or conservation easements, more than 43,000 additional acres or 32 percent of forests are located on land with limited development potential and therefore low vulnerability to conversion to non-forest cover. The remaining 38,000 aces or 27 percent of forest cover is potentially vulnerable to conversion, subject to forest conservation regulations during the land development process.
  • Forest Patch Typology - EPS developed a Forest Patch Typology Map (PDF) a County-wide GIS-based typology of forest patches that identifies the largest forest patches important to water quality, by protection status. The typology identifies forest patches with the highest value for contributing to the hydrologic stability of small watersheds and for protecting streams within small watersheds.
  • Urban Tree Canopy Goals - Baltimore County is one of five local Maryland jurisdictions committed to the development of urban forest canopy goals under the Chesapeake Bay Program’s Executive Council Directive 03-1 (PDF). The project, funded and conducted by the USDA Forest Service in association with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources, is expected to be completed in Fall 2007.
  • Urban Forest Effects (UFORE) Model - EPS has contracted with the USDA Forest Service to conduct an assessment of the structure, health, and functions of Baltimore County’s urban forest. Working with the University of Maryland at Baltimore County’s Center for Urban Ecology and Education (CUERE), the Forest Service will conduct the UFORE project in summer 2007 for the urbanized areas of the County (within the Urban-Rural Demarcation Line). The project will involve a random sample of 200 plots that are selected to represent the major types of urban land uses.
  • Forest Economic Analysis - The Maryland Department of Natural Resources has applied the State’s Strategic Forest land Assessment to Baltimore County. The Forest Economic Analysis model is a composite view of several factors that describe the physical and economic suitability of forests to provide forest products. It is not, however, a recommendation that these areas be utilized to generate forest products as a primary management objective.
  • Rural Forest Health Monitoring - EPS is working with the USDA Forest Service and the Maryland Department of Natural Resources to design a monitoring system to better understand the structural conditions and stressors for forest patches outside the County’s URDL.
    • At the present time there are very limited data available in any detail to inform public agencies or private landowners about the species composition and health of forest patches and the stressors, such as invasive species, on the sustainability of these forest systems.
    • The monitoring network will be designed to provide local data that can be aggregated to larger spatial scales. The monitoring will include periodic surveys of different areas (“panels”) across rural Baltimore County so as to efficiently measure long-term trends. Existing Forest Service monitoring program including the Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) and Forest Health Monitoring (FHM) programs are being evaluated for applicability.
  • Gypsy Moth Monitoring - The Maryland Department of Agriculture’s Forest Pest Management program conducts surveys for the presence of Gypsy moth egg masses each fall for residential properties greater than 25 aces in size with a 50 percent or greater oak dominance. Detailed information about the program and the location of treated forest blocks is available on the MDA web site.
  • Forest Fragmentation Index - EPS is working with researchers at the University of Vermont at Burlington to develop an index of forest fragmentation. This metric will identify forest patches with high value for interior forest-dependent habitat.

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Program Documentation

Roundtable on Sustainable Forests Case Study

As part of an effort to engage broader communities of forest stakeholders at multiple scales, the national Roundtable on Sustainable Forests committed to develop a case study of Baltimore County’s forest sustainability program for its 2006 Work Plan. The case study will be used to show other local governments one example of how forest sustainability can be implemented at the local level and integrated into existing local planning and environmental programs. The case study (PDF) is now available for download.

American Planning Association Planners Advisory Service (PAS) Report: “Planning for Urban and Community Forestry”

Baltimore County is to be profiled as one of 13 case studies by the American Planning Association for a Planning Advisory Service (PAS) report on planning for urban and community forestry. The PAS reports are distributed via subscription to planning agencies across the U.S. and are also available to the public at cost. The draft case study (PDF) prepared by EPS is available now; the complete PAS report with guiding principles and the full set of case studies will be available from the APA in 2008.

Linking Communities to the Montreal Process Criteria and Indicators

Baltimore County was selected by the Communities Committee of the Seventh American Forest Congress in 2001 to be one of three county-level pilots in the U.S. to explore the application of the Montreal Process Criteria and Indicators framework for forest sustainability.

The Communities Committee is a nonprofit organization made up of a diverse group of people from across the United States who believe local participation in stewardship of natural resources is critical to both forest ecosystem health and community well-being. The Committee’s 2003 Forest Sustainability Indicator Tools for Communities case study (PDF) report (see Baltimore County case study in Appendix D) for this three-year project is available.

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Forest Sustainability Program Presentations

These presentations were made at conferences wherein the focus was on the County’s Forest Sustainability Program and related growth management and reservoir protection programs. The chronological list also documents the various interest groups with whom we are engaging in the dialogue about forest sustainability. Permission is granted for non-commercial use of these materials, with credit to the authors whose names appear on the title slides.

Note - The following PDFs are very large and could take several minutes to download with a high-speed Internet connection. All PDFs open in a new window.

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Revised January 3, 2012

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