Westlake Celebrates Arbor Day

Mayor Clough with Dover Intermediate School poster winners and tree commission members

On Friday, May 5th, a sunny and nice day, Westlake’s fifth grade students at Dover Intermediate School participated in a tree planting and award ceremony that was held at their school and led by Mayor Dennis M. Clough, Paul Quinn III, Westlake’s Service Director, Stan Banard, Urban Forestry Manager for the City of Westlake, Mary Beth Schneidler, Chairperson of the Westlake Tree Commission, and Mr. Nick Miller, DIS Principal. Several weeks prior, the students were invited to create posters depicting “Why trees are important to me!” Their posters were then judged by Tree Commission members Mary Beth Schneidler, Ken Sadd and Diane Morris along with Stan Banard and Paul Quinn.

Over 62 posters were judged with six winners being selected. The top posters were submitted by: Dennis Li, Dieterch Cece Pisanelli, Morgan Abadie, Lily Hoekenga, Viktor Hunter and Stephanie Li. At the tree planting, each of the winners received a Proclamation from the Mayor along with a ribbon recognizing their achievement.

Following the awards, each of the students who submitted a poster, were invited to help plant a Show Time Crabapple Tree in front of their school. Mr. Banard and the Service Dept. helped prepare the site and explained to the students the proper way to plant a tree. The newly planted tree was added to a row of previously planted trees that were just beautiful with their deep pink flowers in bloom.

Arbor Day in the United States began in Nebraska in 1872 when 1 million trees were planted. It was named Arbor Day since “Arbor” means “tree” in Latin. In 1970, President Nixon declared it a national holiday and declared that Arbor Day would be celebrated on the last Friday in April. That holiday continues today throughout the United States with only two states celebrating on a different day because of their growing season… Alaska celebrating in May and Hawaii in November!

Westlake has been a designated Tree City USA for 32 years and has worked very hard to plant and care for the trees in Westlake. Much is also done to educate residents about trees! This tree planting is just one of the many things happening throughout the city to beautify our city and preserve our trees!

Congratulations Dover Intermediate Fifth Graders on a job well done!