The Maryland Urban and Community Forestry Council (MUCFC) brings together urban forestry practitioners, local government representatives, nonprofit partners, educators, arborists, landscape professionals, and other volunteers to support urban and community forestry across Maryland.

The Council provides a way for the Maryland Forest Service to stay connected to the people doing this work at the local level. Members bring practical experience from communities across the state, help identify emerging needs, share approaches that are working, and advise the Forest Service on programs and priorities affecting trees and forests in developed areas.

Maryland has used this kind of cooperative model for decades. The Maryland Community Forestry Council was formally organized in 1992 as a volunteer citizen advisory group to the State Forester. In 2003, it was reorganized as the Maryland Urban and Community Forest Committee, linking urban forestry more directly with the State’s longstanding network of local forestry volunteers and practitioners.

Today, MUCFC continues that role by connecting state programs with local experience and by giving practitioners a place to exchange information, raise issues, and help shape Maryland’s approach to community forestry.

Community Forestry Catalyst Fund

MUCFC members help review applications to the Community Forestry Catalyst Fund (CF2), the Maryland Forest Service’s statewide grant program for forestry work in communities. CF2 now incorporates funding previously offered through the standalone MUCFC grant program, giving applicants one application for a broader range of community forestry projects.

People Loving and Nurturing Trees

The PLANT Recognition Program (People Loving and Nurturing Trees) recognizes outstanding work by Maryland communities to plant, care for, manage, and support their trees and forests. For many years, the program has provided a way to recognize municipalities, schools, neighborhoods, civic organizations, and other groups that make a sustained commitment to community forestry.

The program is currently on hold and is not accepting applications.

Council Membership

MUCFC members represent a range of professions, organizations, and communities involved in urban and community forestry. That mix is intentional. The Council gives the Maryland Forest Service access to perspectives from people working directly with municipal trees, parks, schools, neighborhoods, forest patches, community organizations, and other parts of Maryland’s urban forest.

Members advise on programs and emerging issues, share technical and local knowledge, participate in grant review, and help strengthen connections among state programs and practitioners working across Maryland.

Contact Us

Veronica Guerra
Program Administrator, Urban & Community Forestry
Maryland Forest Service
Maryland Department of Natural Resources
580 Taylor Avenue, E-1
Annapolis, Maryland 21401
(410) 260-8521
[email protected]