Mississauga wins prestigious forestry award

The International Society of Arboriculture (Ontario chapter), an organization for arborists, has recently recognized the City of Mississauga with the Arboriculture Award of Merit for the first time. This recognition is for municipalities, public institutions and non-profit organizations that have shown innovation, leadership, and commitment to arboriculture and urban forestry within Ontario.

Mississauga was nominated and won for its involvement with the Ontario Tree Climbing Championship and the Women in Arboriculture Ontario tree fest events. In addition to hosting the events, the forestry department successfully raised awareness of arboriculture and urban forestry through supporting these events and helping engage the public’s interest. A few of the City’s arborists also volunteered and competed in the Ontario Tree Climbing Championship. The championship took place at RK McMillan Park and was the largest and most successful tree climbing championship ever held in Ontario.

Matt Logan, Past President and Chair of the Awards Committee and Amory Ngan, Manager, Forestry, City of Mississauga.

Photo credit: Sean DeCory, ISA Ontario Conference

Forestry service update

In addition to receiving the Arboriculture Award of Merit, Mississauga is also pleased to share that the forestry team has made significant progress in improving forestry services, streamlining processes, eliminating the backlog of work orders (WO), and enhancing the overall quality of forestry service delivery.

In 2024, the team achieved:

• 81 per cent increase in the total number of pruning and removal WOs closed.
• 46 per cent reduction in the number of status/escalation/priority service requests.
• 86 per cent of service requests (SRs) resolved within Service Level Agreements (SLA) in 2024 compared to 50 per cent in 2023.
• 95 per cent of storm SRs resolved within SLA in 2024 compared to 86 per cent in 2023.
• 90 per cent reduction in the average number days to complete stumping work order from 772 (2020) to 79 (2024).
• 34 per cent increase in the number of street and park trees planted from 4,877 (2023) to over 6,552 (2024).

About Mississauga’s forests and trees

Mississauga’s trees and urban forest are important to sustaining a healthy community and to our environmental, social, and economic well-being. Trees play a crucial role in combating climate change by absorbing harmful carbon dioxide and storing carbon. They also act as natural coolants by providing shade in our streets, help to control floods by slowing down water flow, and provide numerous mental and health benefits. There are more than 2.1 million trees in Mississauga, and so far, Mississauga has planted 598,013 trees through the One Million Trees program.

Tags

• Parks and Forestry