Tara Murray
Brimbank council is seeking support from the state and federal governments to help it plant more trees in the municipality.
The council has planted more than 280,000 in recent years as it tries to aim to increase canopy cover to 30 per cent by 2046.
The municipality’s tree canopy was at 6.2 per cent when that target was set in 2016. It increased to 8.5 per cent in 2018.
Brimbank mayor Ranka Rasic said while the council had received some funding to help plant trees, they needed much more.
“Planting more trees is an investment into a future, where the shade provided by those trees in our streets and parks will significantly reduce the impacts of heatwaves and climate change in our community,” she said.
“Council is committed to greening the municipality through an extensive tree planting program.
“We call on the federal minister for environment and the state minister for energy, environment, and climate change to provide further funding for more tree planting in parks and streets in Brimbank to fast track council’s urban greening initiative.
“We also need to make the schools in our municipality greener and cooler. The shade provided by healthy trees on school grounds is essential to achieving this. Many schools currently have very limited tree planting going on.
‘We call on the Victorian minister for education to support the allocation of funding from the state government for tree planting in state schools.”
As well as writing to the governments, the council put out its draft tree policy and draft significant tree policy.
