Sponsors (8)
The bill directs multi-year federal funding to expand urban tree canopy and target environmental justice—bringing measurable health, economic, and community benefits—while imposing substantial federal and local costs, administrative requirements, and potential implementation or legal challenges.
Residents of low-income, historically underserved, and urban neighborhoods will get more tree canopy, reducing local heat exposure and improving air quality.
Priority grants and program funding create local jobs and workforce training in urban forest planting, maintenance, and community forestry work.
Expanded tree canopy can lower household cooling costs and increase property values for homeowners in canopy-rich neighborhoods.
The bill increases federal spending by billions over five years, which could raise taxpayer costs or require spending offsets elsewhere.
Local governments may face ongoing maintenance, liability, and infrastructure costs to sustain new tree plantings, and plantings could conflict with utilities or built infrastructure if not carefully planned.
State, tribal, and local applicants face administrative burden to meet detailed eligibility, assessment, climate‑informed design, and monitoring requirements, potentially limiting participation.
Based on analysis of 4 sections of legislative text.
Creates a USDA Neighborhood Tree Fund to finance urban tree canopy projects prioritized for disadvantaged, low‑canopy, high‑heat, and community‑led sites and updates advisory council membership rules.
Introduced April 23, 2026 by Shontel M. Brown · Last progress April 23, 2026
Creates a new federal fund at the Department of Agriculture to pay for planting, maintaining, and improving trees and urban canopy in cities and towns, with money targeted to low‑income, low‑canopy, high‑heat, and historically disadvantaged neighborhoods. The program sets program rules (community engagement, tree assessments, climate‑informed design, site prep, species selection, monitoring/maintenance) and limits spending on canopy assessments to no more than 10% of annual Fund amounts. Also sets multi‑year deposit amounts into the Fund for FY2025–FY2029, and updates membership rules for the National Urban and Community Forestry Advisory Council to add three non‑governmental members with specific residency requirements, including at least one from a community under 50,000 people and one from a low‑income community.