Mattapoisett Highway Surveyor Barry Denham stood in the rain last Friday at the edge of Route 6 near Old Rochester Regional raising a sign. There was something about the way he looked at it suggested it meant a lot to him.
    The sign declared Mattapoisett to be a Tree City USA.
    “I have a special feeling toward Mattapoisett’s trees,” Denham said. “From 1958 to 1976 my father was the tree warden. That was during the Dutch elm disease. The town was pretty barren. My father worked hard to replace the trees. He planted between 50 and 60 trees a year. Ronnie Scott and I spent the beginnings of our careers with the town going around watering the trees when we were in our teens. I didn’t have a license yet. He drove the truck and I jumped off to water the trees.”
    Denham and current tree warden Roland Cote poured a lot of muscle into helping Mattapoisett earn its hard-fought for Tree City USA designation. They’ve excavated the earth for the planting of trees on the grounds of the library, Center School, Old Hammondtown School, the Beach House, Historical Museum, and police station. Cote has also done a lot of tree restoration work.
    “Joy. That’s what I feel,” Cote said. “The tree committee worked really hard for (the Tree City USA designation). Maybe it will make people more aware of the importance of trees, not only for beauty and shade, but for the environment.”
    Elaine Botelho, chair of the Mattapoisett Tree Committee, said two years of effort was poured into earning the Tree City USA designation. A number of requirements had to be met and meticulously documented. The town’s open space plan had to be documented, and a tree planting plan had to be created.  Documentation indicating a full-time tree warden and an accounting of his work had to be provided. Proof that the town had made a contribution equaling $2 per citizen toward the restoration and planting of trees was required (funding to meet the requirement was derived in part through a Town Meeting appropriation and in part through the tree warden’s budget.)
    Annual commemoration of Arbor Day by the town was also a requirement. In Mattapoisett, Arbor Day commemorations have included a tree planting and dedication, an Old Hammondtown School poster project, and a tree care workshop offered in April at that school.
    Botelho said one of the most ambitious projects undertaken by the tree committee (in the process of seeking the Tree City designation) was a campaign to get residents to plant 150 trees during Mattapoisett’s Sesquicentennial Celebration. Botelho said planting of more than 100 trees was documented and that she knows of many more trees planted that weren’t documented.
    Botelho, her husband Mike (Mattapoisett’s town administrator) and Sandy Hering represented Mattapoisett at The Tree City USA Forum and Awards Program, May 9, in Old Sturbridge Village. A Tree City USA award and a State Senate citation were presented to the town. The plaque has a permanent home at the Town Hall, as will the citation after framing.
    Asked about the presentation of the plaque, Elaine Botelho said, “It was like the frosting on the cake. I was absolutely thrilled.”
    Tree City USA is about “the beautification of the town, increasing the canopy, and the shade,” Botelho said. “(It says) we’re not a concrete town.”
    “The first time I came into town and down North Street and saw the canopy I thought wow,” Botelho said. “I was in awe of the beauty, the serenity and the calmness. It was nature. It makes you want to be home. This is our town and we are making the town more beautiful.”