This is a film made by tree advocates in Sacramento and tells the story and history of planting almost 600,000 trees in the Sacramento to shade the city in order to reduce electric bills. This community-wide effort followed the successful referendum to shut down the accident-plagued Rancho Seco nuclear power plant. Planting trees on such a large scale was an innovative way to replace nuclear energy and reduce peak electricity demand during the hot summer months, saving the city and ratepayers money. Sacramento’s city-owned public utility, SMUD, provided marketing assistance and much of the funding for the purchase of the trees. Many hundreds of volunteers, homeowners, businesses and schools provided much of the labor led by the Sacramento Tree Foundation. Now celebrated as one of most tree-filled cities in the world — trees are an embedded part of the city’s identity for Sacramento’s residents.
The producers of the film are excited to come to Redding to answer questions after the showing and a discussion will follow.
What can we learn from the parallels? Redding’s hot summers, our citizen-owned municipal utility, a city known for our volunteer spirit, residents who would appreciate and benefit from lower utility bills. This is a free event, for more information go to www.ecoshasta.org.
Date: Friday, September 21
Time: 6:30 pm
Place: First United Methodist Church, 1825 East St., Redding, CA
