Project No. 1:
Great Ohio Planting Day
It's important to keep the state you call home
a beautiful place in which to live, work and
play. Ohioans supported the appearance of
one of its special green spaces by restoring and
transforming a dilapidated Cincinnati park on
the fourth annual Great Ohio Planting Day.
Keep Ohio Beautiful (KOB), an organization
dedicated to empower Ohio communities to
create a green, sustainable environment to live,
planned this year's Great Ohio Planting Day to
take place at the McMicken Play Area, located
north of downtown Cincinnati.
Davey stepped in to help KOB, along with
local affiliate Keep Cincinnati Beautiful (KCB),
to uplift a once unusable park to an enhanced
play area for kids. Davey volunteers included
the following: Davey Resource Group (DRG)
Manager of Natural Resource Consulting, Kar-
en Wise; Operations Manager of Government
Services Herb Landmann; Project Manager
Rachel Comte; Project Manager Pete Sorensen;
Consulting Arborist Zachariah Florence; and
Inventory Arborist Technician Kevin Ptacek.
Trey Webster, operations manager of the north
central region, R/C services; Cincinnati R/C
District Manager Bob Meoak; and S&S Techni-
cian Fred McLane also joined the cause.
Davey's volunteers planted five new trees,
including three bald cypresses, one oak and
one serviceberry, throughout the play area
to provide shade, reduce stormwater run-off
and help clean the air. Davey volunteers also
pruned, removed and cleared two big chip
trucks' full of invasive trees and brush sur-
rounding the park.
"The hope is you beautify the park, plant
some trees and clean up a densely vegetated
fence line and make it more welcoming and
safer," Wise says.
This is Davey's fourth year volunteering with
KOB on Great Ohio Planting Day. This was
the perfect opportunity for all volunteers to
take a break from their normal work schedules
and give back to their community.
Spruce Up Your State
Idea submitted by: Karen Wise, DRG manager of natural resource consulting
The McMicken Play Area used to be
filled with crime and was an eye-sore to the
community. But now, with new trees and a
brand new wall on which the park sits—
including a fresh coat of paint—it's now a
vibrant community park for families to explore.
14 | November/December 2015
Right: DRG volunteers, Zachariah Flor-
ence and Kevin Ptacek, work together
to plant a tree.
Below: Davey's volunteer crew,
including Herb Landmann, Karen Wise,
Rachel Comte, Trey Webster, Pete Sorensen,
Zachariah Florence, Kevin Ptacek and Bob
Meoak (pictured from left to right), planted
five trees and removed non-native brush.
Below right: Bob Meoak addresses
Davey volunteers to review plans for the day.
