July 2012

TCT participants explore conservation

The Tree Farm program relies on volunteer inspectors to work with landowners to

develop management plans, certify new Tree Farms and reinspect existing ones.

To provide a refresher on the Standards of Sustainability for Forest Certification for existing inspectors or to train foresters interested in becoming inspectors, the Arkansas Tree Farm program will hold a workshop on Tuesday, August 7, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., in Little Rock. Lunch is included. The workshop qualifies for 4 hours of Category 1 Continuing Forestry Education. An online refresher course is also

Tree Farm training set for August 7

Max BraswellAFA Executive Vice President

At its spring meeting, the Board of Directors endorsed a plan for

AFA Membership Recruitment—developed by a Membership Task Force and the staff. The foundation for each component of the plan is the goal that AFA will create a culture that incorporates membership recruitment into meetings, communications vehicles, activities and public outreach efforts. This culture will allow AFA members to take an active role in growing the membership on an ongoing basis.

One of the specific strategies identified in the plan is: Identify and capitalize on relationships that exist within our community to target related business and organizations that would benefit from AFA membership. A recent example of this strategy in action is Bryan Davis, Davis Dubose Forestry and Real Estate, who has worked with the staff to develop messages and tools for reaching out to his professional contacts. He is touting the value of AFA membership and encouraging participation in the AFA Annual Meeting, set for September 25-27 at the Holiday Inn Airport in Little Rock. We really appreciate the support of Davis Dubose Forestry and Real Estate and encourage you to find ways to get involved with the strategy.

In each issue of TreeTalk, we will

AFA membership strategy endorsed

See ‘Membership’ on back page

available for current inspectors.

“Arkansas’s 130 certified inspectors volunteer their time to help the state’s 1,950 Tree Farmers learn how to manage their forests wisely. They are the backbone of the program and without their efforts, Tree Farmers would not be able to receive the benefits of having certified timber,” AFA Administrative Director Jennifer Lambert said.

To register for the August 7 workshop, please contact Jennifer at (501) 374-2441 or jlambert@arkforests.org.

Each summer,

the AFA Education Foundation sponsors the Teacher Conservation Tour (TCT), an intensive four-day workshop that emphasizes forestry and natural resources conservation through classroom presentations and field tours. The 2012 TCT was held June 26-29, based out of Monticello.

Twenty-three educators from around the state participated and earned 24 professional development hours.

“I will recommend [TCT] to anyone who will listen,” one participant wrote on her evaluation form. “The ‘green’ movement in the U.S. should be aware that AFA has been ‘green’ all along!”

“Showing forestry in action through facility and field tours makes a tremendous

impression on the TCT participants,” said AFA Education Foundation Director of Forestry Education Rob Beadel. “And with the topics we cover in the classroom, these educators are well equipped with conservation education information and tools.”

TCT sponsors include: AgHeritage Farm Credit Services, ArborGen, Bibler Bros. Lumber, CPS-Timberland, Deltic, Domtar Industries, Evergreen Packaging, Georgia-Pacific, International Paper, Maxwell Hardwood Flooring, Neeley Forestry, Allen and Ginny Nipper, Plum Creek, Potlatch Forest Holdings, The Price Companies, RMS Timberlands and Weyerhaeuser.

CALENDAR

July 1810 a.m. – Tree Farm Committee

AFA Office, Little Rock

August 4Drew County

Log A Load For KidsMonticello

August 710 a.m. – Tree Farm Inspector

TrainingArkansas State Employees

AssociationLittle Rock

August 710 a.m. – AFA Executive Committee

AFA Office, Little Rock

August 149:30 a.m. – Forest Practices

CommitteeAFA Office, Little Rock

September 22Bradley County

Log A Load For KidsHermitage

September 24-28Prescribed Fire Course for

Natural Resource Management Professionals

Camp Robinson, N. Little Rock

September 25-2767th AFA Annual Meeting

Holiday Inn Airport, Little Rock

September 29River Valley Log A Load For Kids

Russellville

October 20Central Arkansas

Log A Load For KidsSheridan

ACH opens South Wing, includingLog A Load For Kids Emergency Dept.

On June 21, 175

people attended the AFA Education Foundation’s landowner workshop on Oil and Gas Leasing in the Brown Dense Formation: What Every Landowner Should Know at the El Dorado Conference Center.

Attorney Jim Rankin, with Perkins Trotter PLLC, led the program, which addressed these topics: The Brown Dense Formation – Information and perspective about what’s happening with oil and gas leasing in the geological formation known as the Brown

Oil and gas workshop draws crowdDense; Oil and Gas Lease Terms, Tips and Pitfalls – A focus on selected lease terms and how they affect the landowner; and What’s next? Tips for what

landowners can expect after production begins.

“This workshop generated an overwhelming response from landowners,” said AFA Education Foundation Director of Forestry Education Rob Beadel. “We will certainly evaluate the possibility of holding another one in the Brown Dense area in the future.”

Four years after breaking ground, Arkansas Children’s Hospital (ACH)

opened the doors to its largest ever expansion project, the 258,000-square foot South Wing on June 13. The patient facility brings a new standard of care to families in Arkansas with the debut of an entirely new emergency department bearing the Log A Load For Kids name, updated intensive care units for cardiovascular and neonatal patients, and five new outpatient clinics.

Donors to the $160 million Century of Possibility Centennial Campaign have provided more than $24 million to the South Wing project. Gift commitments to the campaign totaling more than $105 million have been secured and are focused on the key priorities of pediatric care, research, education and prevention.

In 2008, Log A Load For Kids pledged to contribute all funds raised though 2013 to help fund a new Trauma Unit, a state-of-the art facility for treating the most seriously injured children. In late 2011, ACH asked Log A Load to extended this commitment and add an additional $2 million from 2013-2017 fund raising efforts, designated as follows:

• $1 million to Emergency Services• $1 million to the Trauma Program

“We have looked forward to this day

(Left to right) Log A Load volunteers Grant and Gay Pace and Ann and Rex Lawrence are proud of the Log A Load For Kids Emergency Department at ACH.

for more than half a decade,” said ACH President and CEO Jonathan Bates, MD. “As we mark our 100th year of service to the children of Arkansas, we begin the next century with the South Wing as an outstanding resource for their care.”

This image of trees and logs is incorporated into the flooring, as part of the wayfinding system.

Arkansas Champion Tree art exhibit travels stateThe tour of Arkansas Champion Trees: An

Artist’s Journey will open at the Arkansas Arts Center Terry House Community Gallery, 7th and Rock Streets, in Little Rock, on Sunday, September 16, with a reception from 3 to 5 pm.

This exhibit, by Hot Springs artist Linda W. Palmer, will then travel across the state with grant support from the Arkansas Arts Council and the generosity of Champion Donors Plum Creek, Domtar Industries, and the Williams-Palmer Families, and Medalist Donors Robyn and John Horn, of Little Rock.

The artist’s research and artwork are highlighted in an original program currently under production by the Arkansas Educational Television Network. The program and accompanying educator’s guide, and additional teacher resources, will be available in Spring 2013 to enrich the exhibit’s educational emphasis. The exhibit website at www.championtreesexhibit.com goes live later this month.

“We are so grateful for Plum Creek’s Linda W. Palmer. Post Oak (Quercus stellata). Miller County, Waldo, AR. 2011. Color pencil on paper.

leadership,” said Project Manager Barbara Satterfield. “They and Domtar have made this tour accessible to all Arkansans.”

Four time slots are still available within the two-year tour; however, the show is already scheduled to be seen at the Arkansas River Valley Arts Center in Russellville, the Botanical Garden of the Ozarks in Fayetteville, the University of the Ozarks in Clarksville, Two Rivers Museum in Ashdown, the South Arkansas Arts Center in El Dorado, the Arts & Sciences Center for Southeast Arkansas in Pine Bluff and the Arkadelphia Arts Center in Arkadelphia,

with slots pending for a public library and a community college in additional communities.

For more information about the Champion Tree project, contact Barbara Satterfield at (501) 733-9916.

Financial expert

Danielle Dimartino Booth, who sounded an early warning about the housing bubble as a controversial business columnist for The Dallas Morning News, is still peering into her crystal ball and will share her insights at the AFA Annual Meeting on Wednesday, September 26, at the Holiday Inn Airport in Little Rock.

DiMartino Booth is a Senior Financial Analyst and Advisor on monetary policy to Dallas Federal Reserve President Richard W. Fisher. She researches, writes and speaks about the intersection and interaction of the economy and the financial markets. DiMartino Booth speaks to audiences nationwide about the origins of the housing and credit crises.

Her current speech focuses on the implications of the interruption of the housing market correction and why it impinges the economic recovery.

DiMartino Booth’s most recent written work is The Fallacy of a Pain-Free Path to a Healthy Housing Market. In addition, she has written Fed Policy in the Financial Crisis: Arresting the Adverse Feedback Loop, Fed Intervention: Managing Moral Hazard in Financial Crises and From Complacency to Crisis: Financial Risk Taking in the Early 21st Century, co-authored with Dallas Fed Director of Research Harvey Rosenblum, as well as The Rise and Fall of Subprime Mortgages and Fed Confronts Financial Crisis by Expanding its Role as Lender of Last Resort, co-authored with Dallas Fed Senior Policy Advisor, John Duca.

Prior to joining the Dallas Fed, DiMartino Booth worked for The Dallas Morning News from 2003 to 2006 as a business columnist. Her daily column on the economy and financial markets, with a particular emphasis on the housing market, gained a global audience.

Housing market expert, financial analyst to share economic recovery insight at AFA Annual Meeting

Before moving to Dallas, DiMartino Booth was a Vice President at Credit Suisse in New York City from 1996 to 2002 where she worked in the fixed income, equity and private equity markets.

DiMartino Booth was a College of Business Scholar at the University of Texas at San Antonio, where she earned her BBA. She also holds an MBA in Finance and International Business from the University of Texas at Austin and an MS in Journalism from Columbia University.

The 67th AFA Annual Meeting is scheduled for September 25-27 at the Holiday Inn Airport in Little Rock. Registration information will be mailed in the next few weeks. The meeting agenda is available online at arkforests.org/programs-meeting.html.

Businesses and organizations interested in being sponsors and/or exhibitors can download an information packet on the website as well. To be listed in the meeting registration brochure, please send sponsor/exhibitor forms to AFA by July 25.

profile another piece of the plan.

One of our best strategies we have is to capitalize on the strong relationships you have with people who should be members of AFA. It’s is a great way to reach large landowners, manufacturing and corporate members and related businesses.

So, here’s what you can do to join Davis Dubose Forestry and Real Estate: Identify and/or contact key vendors, suppliers and customers and encourage them to join AFA. We will work with you to develop letters, bill stuffers, provide information on AFA or help make contacts.

Please don’t hesitate to contact me or any member of the staff about membership or any other issue.

Crowder visits D.C. Congressional offices to promote family forestsAmerican Forest Foundation

On June 18, Tom Crowder, a Little Rock Tree Farmer, visited Washington, D.C. to

visit with the Arkansas delegation. As many of you well know, Arkansas’s Congressional delegation has long been supportive of family forest owner issues.

This spring, Sen. Mark Pryor introduced the Forest Products Fairness Act, which fixed the USDA Biobased Markets Program, a labeling and federal procurement program, to include forest products. Currently, the program excludes many forest products, and instead, awards “certified biobased” labels to products that directly compete with American-grown forest products—like bamboo flooring from China. Sen. John Boozman quickly responded by cosponsoring this important legislation.

A companion bill was produced in the House, sponsored by U.S. Reps. Glenn Thompson (R-PA) and Kurt Schrader (D-OR). Representatives Steve Womack

and Mike Ross were original cosponsors and Representatives Tim Griffin and Rick Crawford both signed onto the bill following Tom’s visit to D.C. Arkansas is now the only state to have all of its members of Congress on this bill, proving the delegation understands the importance of family forests.

While in D.C., Tom met with staff from Senators Boozman and Pryor and Representatives Griffin and Crawford. He has worked to establish a strong relationship with his members, and as a result, they respect his policy concerns. It’s important to maintain relationships with decision-makers, and Tom works tirelessly to do so for the sake of his Tree Farm, his family, and all of Arkansas’s family forest owners.

Arkansas forest owners should be proud of the support they receive in Washington, D.C. for forest products markets, Farm Bill conservation programs, and the estate tax, among many other issues.

MEMBERSHIP, cont. from front