Illinois General Assembly Directs Towns To Reevaluate Their Emerald Ash Borer Management Plans

Illinois General Assembly Directs Towns To Reevaluate Their Emerald Ash Borer Management Plans

Invasive specie costing government unplanned millions

CHICAGO, IL – The Illinois General Assembly passed a resolution last session that directs municipalities throughout the state to reevaluate how they currently manage the Emerald Ash Borer issue. Many towns developed plans using financial and scientific information that is today outdated. Because the cost of managing Emerald Ash Borer is rising exponentially, the General Assembly recommends that municipalities assess alternative strategies that might provide a relief to local government operating budgets.

“In Illinois, local government approaches for dealing with this environmental disaster span a wide range of costs and actions,” commented State Senator Mike Frerichs (D-Champaign). “In northeastern Illinois, Emerald Ash Borer management now competes with funding for police and school books. Scientists have found that we can slow the loss of our urban forests through treatment which allows us to avoid the financial tsunami of letting our trees expire.”

Ash trees compose approximately 20 percent of urban trees, which accounts for more than four million trees in northeastern Illinois. The Illinois Department of Agriculture has stated that every ash tree will be infested with the Emerald Ash Borer within a few years, and if not treated with an insecticide, every tree will die a few years after infestation. The cost is expected to run into the billions. Emerald Ash Borer infestation is in full bloom throughout the Chicago area and it affects many other areas of the state as far south as Decatur and Bloomington, and as far west as Quincy.

“We applaud Senator Frerichs and the Illinois General Assembly for passing this resolution,” stated John Friedmann, executive director of the Cook County nonprofit group ‘Save Your Ash.’ “Too many towns set bad policy years ago and they are now either unaware or refuse to concede that the economics and science are very different today. It is far less costly to save our ash trees then to let them die. We hope that towns like Mundelein, Joliet, and Aurora will reassess their cost options and discover that treatment is economical and environmentally superior to removal.”

The resolution passed by the Illinois General Assembly requests that municipalities evaluate different alternatives. The Society of Municipal Arborists recommends that local governments adopt an integrated plan that allows for the removal of undesirable ash trees along with the preservation of desirable ash trees. Undesirable ash trees include those that are damaged or sickly, or in poor locations such as under power transmission lines. Preserving desirable ash trees sustains their beneficial effect on the local environment, which includes air purification and rain water storage, in addition to their aesthetic value. Trees can be treated from the time they bud out in the spring until they lose leaves in the fall.