Arbor Day: City Plants Tree at Fairview South Celebration

students helped throw the dirt on a tree planted Friday on the school's playground as part of the city's Arbor Day celebration.

The Brookfield Junior Women's Club donated the tree, a Fall Fiesta Sugar Maple. It will grow to about 55 feet tall, about 40 feet wide, said Gary Majeski, parks and forestry superintendent.

"It's going to be a nice-sized shade tree," Majeski said.

At an event with music from Side by Side, a state official designated Brookfield as a Tree City USA for the 14th consecutive year. Some municipalities, such as Milwaukee and Kenosha, have been Tree Cities for 30 or more years, said Kim Sebastian, regional urban forestry coordinator for the state Department of Natural Resources.

Friday was Brookfield's 20th annual Arbor Day celebration. At the first one, at Wirth Park in 1992, "the rain, sleet and snow was moving sideways.... so I'm pretty thankful about the day and the weather here today," said Bill Kolstad, city director of Parks, Recreation and Forestry.

The city rotates its annual tree planting event; the last time Fairview was the city's Arbor Day site was in 2001 when a tree was planted in the school's garden.

Anyone can donate to the city's memorial tree program to have a tree planted on city parkland in someone's name, Ponto said.

Follow us on Twitter | Like us on Facebook | Sign up for our daily newsletter