Wet weather was not enough to deter about 100 people from planting more than 700 trees, shrubs and other plants at three Redmond parks on Saturday.
The volunteer effort was part of the fourth annual Green Redmond Day, a planting event organized by the Green Redmond Partnership (GRP) to kick off a season of additional planting in and around local parks.
“It was kind of a wet day. It amazes me how hearty people are,” said Chris Tolonen, lead maintenance worker for the City Of Redmond’s parks operations, about people volunteering their time outdoors despite the weather.
GRP is a partnership between the City of Redmond and Forterra, a nonprofit organization in Western Washington whose goal is to secure urban, rural and wild places that are keystones of a sustainable future.
According to its website, GRP is focused on building a “sustainable network of healthy urban green spaces for the benefit and enjoyment of our entire city.” The goal of the partnership is to restore 1,035 acres of forested land throughout the city.
Tolonen said to reach this goal, they recruit volunteers to help by becoming forest stewards and adopting parks and organizing work parties. The work done at these parties includes removing invasive plants and planting native plants.
To make way for the trees and shrubs that were planted on Saturday, Tolonen said there had been removal work done throughout this last year.
Tolonen said planting trees is important for an urban environment for a number of reasons. Some of those benefits include supporting stormwater runoff, storing carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen into the atmosphere.
This year’s parks for Green Redmond Day were Viewpoint, Idylwood and Westside parks. Tolonen said the work party locations change every year.
Norah Kates, a Forterra Green Cities project manager, said they have been partnering with Redmond since 2008. Forterra’s role in the partnership has been to do outreach and run GRP’s volunteer program through recruitment and community engagement. The city, she said, focuses more on the on-the-ground work such as ordering plants and figuring out where to plant them.
Laurie Gogic and Glenn Eades are two volunteer forest stewards who helped lead the work parties at Idylwood and Westside parks, respectively.
Gogic, who recently retired from teaching at John James Audubon Elementary School in Redmond, worked to bring students and families from her former school to Saturday’s work party. She said about 40 people — including students, parents, family members and teachers —from the school attended the event.
“They were all just ready to help,” she said.
Gogic added that the Idylwood work party was led by EarthCorps, an organization whose mission is to build a global community of leaders through local environmental service.
For Gogic’s role, she let students and staff at Audubon know about the work party. After that, two classes — Monique Celeste’s fifth-graders and Debbie Ellis’s second-graders — helped promote it to encourage people to attend.
Eades, who has lived near Westside Park for 50 years, said their long-term goal is to “fix some patches that are not in such good shape by clearing them of blackberries and ivy and (plant) shrubs and trees that will eventually become mature forest.”
He credited the 32 volunteers who attended Saturday’s work party, describing them as impressive.
Tolonen also praised the volunteers — not just the ones who came out last week, but everyone who volunteers throughout the year. He said the assistance they get from volunteers is “tremendous” and makes his job easier.
“The volunteer aspect of it is just huge,” Tolonen said.
For more information about future volunteer opportunities through GRP, visit greenredmond.org.
