Building a Greener Denver

It’s mid-April at City Park’s greenhouse, and a similar scene repeats every year. A mother inspects rows of saplings, running her fingers along bark, reading care tags. She’s choosing a tree for her children to climb in summers to come. Nearby, an elderly man eyes a shade-bearing oak and thinks, “I won’t be here when this is full-grown, but my grandkids will be.” Around them, scores of volunteers in neon vests load trees into cars and hand out care guides. During this event, everyone is focused on a greener future for Denver.

This is what Kim Yuan-Farrell lives for.

Yuan-Farrell is the executive director of The Park People, a Denver nonprofit planting trees and improving parks since 1969. For 17 years, she’s been championing a simple idea with complicated execution: that everyone in Denver—not just people in historically wealthy, well-treed areas—deserves access to shade and clean air.

The numbers are impressive: over 70,000 trees planted organization-wide, closer to 65,000 through Denver Digs Trees alone. But numbers don’t capture the relationship-building that happens on distribution days, or in the trickle-down effects from planting trees that spread across the entire city.

According to Yuan-Farrell, the research backing the value of trees is staggering in scope. They shade and cool neighborhoods, filter air pollution, reduce flooding, absorb carbon, and increase property values. Patients in hospital rooms with views of trees recover faster. Workers are more productive near green space. Students learn better after recess breaks outdoors.

“Everybody deserves access to all these benefits that trees provide,” says Yuan-Farrell. It’s not a mission statement read from a plaque. It’s something she’s spent 17 years living.

Finding Her Calling

Yuan-Farrell didn’t grow up dreaming of forestry. As an undergraduate, she studied anthropology and environmental studies. While pursuing her master’s degree from Yale School of the Environment, she completed internships focused on community forestry work, where she saw firsthand how trees could bind neighborhoods together and serve as tools for community revitalization.

“I saw the power of that work,” she recalls simply.

When she relocated to Colorado, she searched for an organization linking community forestry and environmental justice. The Park People, then just two staff members, fit. She was hired as program manager and spent years building the vision that is now shared among a staff of 15.

What she never imagined was how much of her work would become about listening—to residents, to neighbors, to the people who live with the lowest canopy and highest summer temperatures.

Making Trees Accessible

Denver Digs Trees began more than 40 years ago by addressing a straightforward problem: Trees are expensive. Today, a professionally planted tree costs $600 to $900. For families on modest incomes, that’s prohibitive.

So, The Park People created a program that gave everyone a more accessible pathway to urban forestry. Every January, residents can apply for free or subsidized trees, choosing from eight to 12 species approved by the Denver City Forester. In mid-February, applications close. Then the real work begins.

For every street tree, The Park People staff and trained volunteers visit the site personally. They check spacing, assess sunlight, and examine overhead wires. Because a tree planted under the wrong conditions becomes a problem 20 years down the road.

Mid-to-late April brings distribution, when the tree pickup site becomes a gathering place for enthusiastic new tree caretakers.

“It’s become a really fun community tradition that people look forward to,” says Yuan-Farrell. “Usually a day that’s really positive and uplifting and cheerful.”

Around 100 volunteers help on distribution day. An arborist circulates, answering questions. For residents with physical limitations, volunteers deliver and plant trees free. A few hundred more pitch in during outreach months, canvassing neighborhoods door-to-door.

But the work doesn’t stop when the trees are distributed. In well-established neighborhoods where mature canopy already exists, succession planting is constant. Trees age, development happens, and the next generation of shade needs to be ready.

The Multiplier Effect

Three years ago, Yuan-Farrell and her team made a decision that changed everything. Instead of showing up with expertise, they recruited resident leaders from their lowest-canopy neighborhoods, including Globeville, Elyria-Swansea, and Valverde. Compared to areas like Wash Park or Belcaro, where canopy percentages sit at a healthy 28 percent to 31 percent, these low-canopy neighborhoods are as low as 5 percent.

The Park People wasn’t interested in enlisting outside consultants. They wanted neighbors. People who lived the inequity every summer and were invested in seeing the number of trees planted grow exponentially.

“When we started this really powerful resident leadership work, we saw those numbers expand like sevenfold,” says Yuan-Farrell.

The relationship shifted. When neighbors led outreach, when residents made decisions about what their streets needed, people showed up differently. They showed up with ownership. Even the Colorado State Forest Service noticed. Last year, they asked The Park People to lead statewide training on urban forestry practice.

Building the Ecosystem

Beyond tree distribution, The Park People has pursued larger park improvements that shape Denver’s green infrastructure. The Cranmer Park Sundial and Plaza renovation in Hilltop transformed a historic neighborhood gathering space. Gates Tennis Center in Cherry Creek—an award-winning facility built in 1975 on what used to be an old landfill—represents how the organization thinks beyond individual trees to entire ecosystems of green space.

But scaling impact requires more than capital projects. Three years ago, The Park People piloted TreeForce, an eight-week pre-apprenticeship program preparing recently incarcerated people for careers in urban forestry. Even if The Park People scaled up tenfold, it wouldn’t meet all of Denver’s tree-planting needs. The city needs a workforce. It needs people who understand both the science and soul of this work.

Yuan-Farrell sees The Park People evolving into a “community greening hub.” The organization purchased new headquarters last year and is fundraising for renovations that will provide space for trainings and community gatherings.

When Yuan-Farrell talks about what sustains her after 17 years, she doesn’t reference awards won. Instead, it’s the telltale signs of her organization’s efforts that she sees every day as she drives through Denver neighborhoods: Children climbing young trees that weren’t there before and families enjoying shade on 95-degree days.

“The outputs of your work are so tangible and visible,” says Yuan-Farrell. “When you plant a tree, when you improve a park, when you bring a community together around a shared vision, you see it. You feel it. It’s a really heart-filling experience.”

Get Involved With The Park People

Want to Plant a Tree?

Residents in any Denver neighborhood can request free or subsidized trees. Applications for Denver Digs Trees open in January at theparkpeople.org, and the deadline is mid-February. You can sign up for an application reminder alert on the website.

Want to Volunteer?

Visit www.theparkpeople.org and fill out the volunteer application. You’ll receive notices about upcoming volunteer opportunities, from outreach and canvassing to distribution day help and tree delivery/planting assistance.

Want to Support the Work?

Individual donations are critical, especially as government funding decreases. Donate at www.theparkpeople.org or call 303-722-6262 to learn about giving opportunities. Businesses interested in sponsoring tree planting projects through the Mile High Tree Champions program are welcome to reach out.

Photographs courtesy of The Park People

Seth Davis is the local editor of MyDenver and lives in Denver with his wife and two children.