Arboriculture & Urban Forestry 33(4): July 2007 271 community was a Tree City USA. Grado et al. (2006) found that 49% of Mississippi community officials were aware of Tree City USA, although communities with under 10,000 population were less aware. Other recent studies mentioning the Tree City USA program, although not focusing on pro- gram recognition, include studies of community officials in Missouri (Treiman and Gartner 2004) and Maryland (Galvin and Bleil 2004). Educational Sources and Trust Figure 7. Respondents’ familiarity with the Tree Line USA and Tree City USA programs by utility/city. Actual answer choices were: no—definitely never heard of it; maybe— might have heard of it; yes–unsure—heard of it, but not sure what it is; yes–sure—definitely heard of it; and I know what it is. Numbers in legend are the number of years in each program. Tree Line USA is promoted in a number of ways. A web search showed that the NADF posts news releases acknowl- edging recipients. A search with the company name followed by Tree Line USA, and a search of the corporate web sites, revealed the following program promotions, ordered from highest to lowest recognition: Rocky Mountain Power; Salt Lake City, Utah, U.S.; 15% recognition; awarded for 3 years; article in customer news- letter; mention in press release and environmental report. Salt River Project; Phoenix, Arizona, U.S.; 10.8% recog- nition; 7 years; mention on web page. Xcel Energy; Denver, Colorado, and Cheyenne, Wyoming, U.S.; 8% to 9% recognition; 9 years; mention on trees and power lines web page and in 2001 midwestern-area trimming program news release. Idaho Power; Boise, Idaho, U.S.; 7.7% recognition; 8 years; mention on a tree safety and reliability web page and in a 2001 news release. New Mexico Public Service; Albuquerque, New Mexico, U.S.; 4% recognition; 5 years; mention in several news releases and a tree care booklet. Rocky Mountain Power’s Tree Line USA public relations efforts may have been more effective than the other utilities given their relatively high recognition compared with the others and despite the fact that they had received the award for the shortest amount of time, 3 years. No published research was found on the Tree Line USA program. Several studies mentioned Tree City USA, possibly because it has been around much longer. A recent study in Missouri (Treiman and Gartner 2005) found that 60% to 96% of residents did not know or were wrong about whether their Respondents were asked to indicate which information source (selecting only one from a list) “that you would trust the most to help you learn about utility line pruning.” The most trusted source was Extension, selected by over twice as many people as the next highest sources, arborists and state forestry (Fig- ure 8). Tree nonprofits, the web, family, and friends were least chosen. Although utilities would presumably be thought of as knowing a lot about utility pruning, they were only fourth highest in terms of trust with 10.5% selecting them as the most trusted source for such information. Extension’s high level of trust probably relates to its presence in nearly every county, its noncommercial, impartial nature, and its connection with respected land grant universities in each state. The high value placed on Extension as a tree/forest information source has been confirmed in other studies (Kuhns et al. 2005, 1998), although never before in relation to utility pruning. State forestry agencies also were highly trusted, possibly again related to their noncommercial and impartial nature. Arborists’ relatively high trust is heartening but more difficult to explain because they are commercial. Evidently they must be considered impartial when it comes to utility pruning. Recommendations Our recommendations based on our findings and the literature are that, above all, utilities and those they cooperate with need to emphasize communication with the public. As stated Figure 8. Proportion of respondents selecting a source as the most trusted for learning more about utility pruning. ©2007 International Society of Arboriculture
July 2007
| Title Name |
Pages |
Delete |
Url |
| Empty |
Search Text Block
Page #page_num
#doc_title
Hi $receivername|$receiveremail,
$sendername|$senderemail wrote these comments for you:
$message
$sendername|$senderemail would like for you to view the following digital edition.
Please click on the page below to be directed to the digital edition:
$thumbnail$pagenum
$link$pagenum
Your form submission was a success. You will be contacted by Washington Gas with follow-up information regarding your request.
This process might take longer please wait
