TOWARD SUSTAINABLE URBAN FOREST GOVERNANCE: STRATEGIES FOR STAKEHOLDER ENGAGEMENT IN TREE PLANTING AND STEWARDSHIP A Thesis Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Cornell University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Science by Christine Suzanne Moskell January 2012 i © 2012 Christine Suzanne Moskell ii ABSTRACT Cities across the United States are planting thousands, if not millions, of trees to remediate the negative environmental impacts of urbanization and to enhance the livability of urban areas. Engaging residents, property owners and other stakeholders in urban forest management can ensure that newly planted trees become established so that the benefits provided by the trees can be sustained in the long-term. Urban forestry practitioners working in the government and civil society sector play an important role in providing opportunities for stakeholders to participate in the planning, planting and maintenance of urban trees. My thesis utilizes mixed methods research to examine the stakeholder engagement approaches of urban forestry practitioners, residents’ perceptions of their shared role with government and civil society to maintain urban trees, as well as the institutional, physical and social factors within the urban environment that may influence urban forest stewardship behaviors. BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH Christine Moskell was raised in Newburyport, Massachusetts. Growing up on the Atlantic Coast, she spent countless hours with family and friends at the beach and at the Artichoke, a reservoir near her home that is part of the Merrimack River watershed. Christine credits the time she spent in these natural areas with shaping her interest in environmental conservation. As a senior in high school, Christine completed an internship at the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge on Plum Island, a barrier island on the north shore of Boston. Although she enjoyed learning about wildlife management as part of her internship, Christine realized she was more interested in environmental education and the human dimensions of environmental issues. This interest led her to attend Hobart and William Smith Colleges in Geneva, New York where she majored in environmental studies and minored in economics. In 2006, Christine spent the summer traveling in the Lake Baikal region of Siberia and spent the fall semester studying in Australia and New Zealand. In her senior year, Christine completed an honors project about the local foods movement and was an environmental education intern at the Finger Lakes Institute. She graduated cum laude in May 2008. After graduating from college, Christine worked as natural resources community educator for Cornell University Cooperative Extension of Onondaga County in Syracuse, New York. In her position, she supervised adults and youth on numerous stewardship projects in the eastern Finger Lakes and waterways of Central New York, including rain barrel design and construction, urban tree plantings, rain garden installation and invasive aquatic species removals. Christine entered the Department of Natural Resources at Cornell University in Fall 2009 and completed her Master’s Degree in 2012. She will continue in the PhD program in the Department of Natural Resources at Cornell University. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First and foremost, I’d like to thank my advisor Dr. Shorna Broussard Allred for her continued support and guidance throughout the process of completing this thesis. I am grateful for the freedom she gave me to explore my academic interests, for all of her thoughtful reviews of my writing and for all of the countless hours she spent helping me to think through all of my research ideas. I’d also like to thank my committee members, Dr. Scott Peters and Dr. Nancy Wells, for the insight and advice they provided me throughout the writing process. I feel very fortunate to have had them serve on my committee, for they both have given me new and exciting perspectives on natural resource management. I would also like to acknowledge the Ittleson Foundation and the Garden Club of America for providing financial support for my research. This thesis would not have been possible without my colleagues in the Urban Environment Program at Cornell University Cooperative Extension-NYC. I am very thankful to Gretchen Ferenz, Caroline Tse, Lorraine Brooks, Veronique Lambert and Susan Cheng (and fellow graduate student Alex Kudryavstev) for the assistance they provided throughout the research process, and for hosting me as a program assistant in their office over the 2010 summer. They have taught me a lot Extension work, and I have truly enjoyed getting to know and work with each of them. I am also incredibly grateful to them for helping to conduct the survey of residents in Jamaica and Canarsie. Although that survey was extremely cold and frustrating at times, they helped to make those two weeks of surveying perhaps the most insightful and memorable experiences I’ve had in graduate school. This research would also not have been possible without the people who participated in my research. I am incredibly grateful to all of the people in Jamaica and Canarsie in New who iv so kindly took a few minutes to speak with me and to the other surveyors about trees in the midst of the hustle and bustle of the city. I would also like to thank all of the practitioners that I interviewed for taking time out of their busy days for our interview. I would also like to thank the faculty and staff in the Human Dimensions Research Unit for their reviews and suggestions on earlier drafts of my thesis. And I also very much appreciated the support of recent Cornell graduates Kristin Loria, Todd Tucker and Laura Wetzel for their assistance in data entry and transcription. Thanks also to my fellow office mates in Fernow 306/Rice 101B for their moral support and welcome distractions. I’d like to give a huge thanks to my family, especially to my sister Ruthie for letting me sleep on her couch for an entire summer, for helping me navigate the subways in New York City and for all of the ethnic food and bodega adventures in Crown Heights. Also a very special thanks to my parents for always cheering me up on Sunday nights and for always reminding me that I could do this! And last but not least, thanks to Rick for putting up with me throughout this entire process. Thanks for always being my sounding board and practice audience, especially for those times when you had no idea what I was talking about. And most importantly, thanks for always knowing how to make me smile and laugh when I needed it the most. v TABLE OF CONTENTS ! ABSTRACT ......................................................................................................................... i! BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH ............................................................................................. iii! ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ................................................................................................. iv! CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION ................................................................................. 1! Thesis Objectives ....................................................................................................... 3! REFERENCES ................................................................................................................... 6! CHAPTER TWO: AN EXAMINATION OF THE PRACTICE OF STAKEHOLDER ENGAGEMENT IN URBAN FORESTRY ....................................................................... 1! Abstract ...................................................................................................................... 1! Introduction ................................................................................................................ 2! Outcomes of Stakeholder Engagement in Urban Forestry ........................................ 5! Stakeholder Engagement Methods in Urban Forestry ............................................... 6! Challenges for Engagement ..................................................................................... 23! The Present Study .................................................................................................... 25! Methods.................................................................................................................... 25! Results ...................................................................................................................... 27! Discussion ................................................................................................................ 53! Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 60! REFERENCES ................................................................................................................. 63! CHAPTER THREE: RESIDENTS’ BELIEFS TOWARD URBAN FOREST GOVERNANCE IN NEW YORK CITY ......................................................................... 68! Abstract .................................................................................................................... 68! Introduction .............................................................................................................. 70! Literature Review ..................................................................................................... 73! Methods.................................................................................................................... 92! Results ...................................................................................................................