Letter: Don’t clear-cut USCB campus

USCB Hilton Head might be a done deal. But removal of the trees from the site is not.

Hilton Head Island has been an Arbor Day Foundation designated Tree City USA for 14 years, even surviving clear-cutting for the Kroger/Shelter Cove project. That tree removal project is a done deal.

However, there is still time for Town Council and town tree specialist Rocky Browder to see that the site for the island USCB campus is not clear-cut, and for the design to preserve the mature trees now there.

According to the Arbor Day Foundation, trees can reduce energy costs by 25 percent and cut the cost of stormwater management. Trees curb global warming by reducing the need for air conditioning. They remove carbon dioxide from the air, storing it in themselves and the soil. They release oxygen into the air.

Surely USCB will want to protect the trees as part of the university’s effort to fight climate change.

All of the residents who raised Cain about eliminating mature trees on the Kroger site after they were cut down need to raise it now with Town Council and Rocky Browder before the trees on the USCB site are all cut down.

And if the site is largely denuded, then maybe it’s time for Hilton Head to lose its Tree City USA designation.

This story was originally published February 23, 2016 at 7:00 PM with the headline "Letter: Don’t clear-cut USCB campus."