UFST

The Urban Forest Strike Team
Photo by Sarah Ashton

Urban Forest Strike Teams are the result of a very successful disaster response and recovery pilot project originating in Virginia and North Carolina.  The teams are primarily composed of state forestry agency certified arborists and urban foresters trained to make urban tree risk and damage assessments following natural disasters.  In many states, municipal and consulting arborists along with Extension foresters and tree wardens have participated as well.  Urban Forest Strike Teams evaluate individual trees, street by street in a defined disaster area. In particular, they assess storm damaged trees on public property and rights-of-ways to identify risk, recommend removal or pruning mitigation, and qualification for Federal Emergency Management Agency (also called FEMA) debris reimbursement under its Public Assistance program. GPS systems are used to enter data and identify specific locations.

In 2012, SREF contracted with Urban Forestry South to develop a set of online learning modules that will provide UFST trained team members with refresher information just prior to deployment.  These modules will help ensure UFSTs are prepared and ready when disasters strike!

For more information on this project, please contact Sarah Ashton at sashton@sref.info.

Visit UFST:

http://www.ufst.org/

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