Economy
Local Governments Are Paying the Price for Global Trade's Effects on Trees
The emerald ash borer hitched a ride overseas on wooden shipping crates. Now it’s eating into municipal budgets.
When a tree dies in a forest, it eventually falls to earth, disputably makes a sound, and inevitably decomposes to become fodder for future generations. When a tree dies in a city street, a private yard, or a public park, it becomes a lethal threat to people and property. City governments and property owners end up paying to safely dispose of the trunk, and the benefits that tree provided to its neighborhood are lost.
In American cities from the Atlantic to the Midwest, this loss is all too real—and urgent. Local governments are digging deep into emergency funds to cut down ash trees that are plagued by a little green bug: the emerald ash borer.