Words and photos by Sophie Vaughan

Keep Akron Beautiful’s Planting Change: 100K Trees for Akron initiative launched in May 2024 with a community kick-off event at Hardesty Park, with food and art vendors, craft stations, food trucks and a white oak sapling giveaway.

Keep Akron Beautiful’s website states that Akron’s tree coverage has declined from 40% to 34% in the last decade, and the tree canopy is projected to decrease to 30% by 2040. Akron loses 6,540 trees annually. The Planting Change campaign has an ambitious goal to plant 100,000 trees by 2034 to help restore the city’s green canopy and maintain a balanced ecosystem.

Keep Akron Beautiful Flowerscape Director Leah Heiser says that Akron is losing tree canopy coverage at such a fast rate due to a lack of tree replacement when trees start to decline. She says that the areas with the most need for improvement are South and East Akron.