Mission

Tree Pitts­burgh is an envi­ron­men­tal non-prof­it orga­ni­za­tion ded­i­cat­ed to strength­en­ing and build­ing com­mu­ni­ty vital­i­ty by restor­ing and pro­tect­ing the urban for­est through tree plant­i­ng and care, edu­ca­tion, advo­ca­cy, and land conservation.Tree Pitts­burgh is a reg­is­tered 501( c )3.

Vision

Our vision is to cre­ate a healthy urban for­est for all by inspir­ing and engag­ing peo­ple to main­tain, plant, and pro­tect trees. We believe that every­one has the right to expe­ri­ence the many health, envi­ron­men­tal, and social ben­e­fits that trees pro­vide. A green­er city cre­ates more equi­table and vital com­mu­ni­ties today, and for the future gen­er­a­tions who follow.

Equity Statement

As an orga­ni­za­tion ded­i­cat­ed to mak­ing our com­mu­ni­ty a bet­ter place to live for every­one, Tree Pitts­burgh stands against racism and hate. Tree Pitts­burgh is ded­i­cat­ed to the fair, just, and equi­table treat­ment of all races, cul­tures, nation­al ori­gins, gen­ders, gen­der iden­ti­ties, gen­der expres­sions, reli­gions, sex­u­al ori­en­ta­tions, and socioe­co­nom­ic statuses.

We believe that no one should be exclud­ed or feel unwel­comed from par­tic­i­pat­ing in envi­ron­men­tal stew­ard­ship or con­tribut­ing their voice to plans or activ­i­ties that impact their community.

You can read our full equi­ty state­ment here.

You can read our anti-racism state­ment here on our blog.

Annual Reports

Check out Tree Pitts­burgh’s most recent year­ly accom­plish­ments in our Year in Review. For a more detailed look at the orga­ni­za­tion, includ­ing our 990s, please check our Guidestar pro­file.

2022 Year in Review

2021 Year in Review

2020 Year in Review

2019 Year in Review

2018 Year in Review

History

Grow­ing out of cit­i­zen con­cern for the health and well­be­ing of the City’s urban for­est, mem­bers of the Pitts­burgh Shade Tree Com­mis­sion orga­nized Tree Pitts­burgh, for­mer­ly Friends of the Pitts­burgh Urban For­est, in 2006 to car­ry out fundrais­ing, edu­ca­tion, and stew­ard­ship activ­i­ties aimed at restor­ing and pro­tect­ing Pitts­burgh’s trees.

Key Mile­stones in our history:

1995 — Carnegie Mel­lon report, Pitts­burgh’s Urban For­est: Plant­i­ng for the Future, is pub­lished, out­lin­ing the declin­ing state of the urban for­est and need for action
1998 — Pitts­burgh Shade Tree Com­mis­sion (PTSC) re-established
2005 — PTSC com­mis­sions City of Pitts­burgh Street Tree Inven­to­ry and Man­age­ment Plan
2005 — PTSC launch­es ear­ly stages of the Tree Ten­der program
2006 — PTSC estab­lish­es Tree Pittsburgh
2007 — Tree Pitts­burgh pub­lish­es an iTree Streets report based on 2005 Street Tree Inven­to­ry, quan­ti­fy­ing the ben­e­fits that trees pro­vide and estab­lish­ing a cost ben­e­fit analy­sis for its care
2007 — Tree Pitts­burgh takes over Tree Ten­der program
2008 — Tree­Vi­tal­ize Pitts­burgh is launched at the West­ern PA Con­ser­van­cy in part­ner­ship with Tree Pitts­burgh, City of Pitts­burgh, Alleghe­ny Coun­ty, and PA DCNR
2010 — Urban Tree Canopy Analy­sis com­plet­ed for Alleghe­ny County
2010 — Tree Pitts­burgh estab­lish­es the Her­itage Nurs­ery, a nurs­ery where all trees are grown from local­ly col­lect­ed seed
2011 — Tree Pitts­burgh leads the cre­ation of the City of Pitts­burgh Urban For­est Mas­ter Plan, a 20-year road map aimed at pro­tect­ing and restor­ing the City’s tree canopy
2015 — West­ern PA Con­ser­van­cy and PTSC updat­ed the City’s street tree inven­to­ry and man­age­ment plan
2017 — Tree Pitts­burgh com­mis­sions a new tree canopy analy­sis 2006–2016 which shows a loss of 10,000 acres of tree canopy across Alleghe­ny County
2018 — Tree Pitts­burgh breaks ground on its new cam­pus on the Alleghe­ny Riv­er in Lawrenceville that includes the Her­itage Tree Nurs­ery, offices, work­shops, edu­ca­tion cen­ter, and out­door classroom

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    Favorite Tree

    East­ern hemlock
    (Tsuga canaden­sis)

Danielle Crum­rine
Exec­u­tive Director

For over 20 years, Danielle has worked in var­i­ous capac­i­ties in the Pitts­burgh envi­ron­men­tal com­mu­ni­ty. She has served as Tree Pitts­burgh’s Exec­u­tive Direc­tor for 15 years, where she has led the orga­ni­za­tion through sig­nif­i­cant growth — includ­ing their cur­rent effort to trans­form a for­mer steel mill site into Tree Pitts­burgh’s head­quar­ters, includ­ing a tree nurs­ery, edu­ca­tion cen­ter, and office building.

Pri­or to join­ing Tree Pitts­burgh in 2007, she was the found­ing Board Pres­i­dent and Exec­u­tive Direc­tor of Alleghe­ny Clean­Ways, a group ded­i­cat­ed to empow­er­ing peo­ple to fight ille­gal dump­ing and lit­ter­ing in Alleghe­ny County.

Danielle was named a top 40 under 40 envi­ron­men­tal leader across the state of Penn­syl­va­nia by the PA Envi­ron­men­tal Coun­cil, and in 2011, she was a Board mem­ber for the Alliance for Com­mu­ni­ty Trees — the only nation­al orga­ni­za­tion sole­ly focused on the needs of those engaged in urban forestry. In 2015, as ACTrees Pres­i­dent, she led the merg­er of ACTrees with the Arbor Day Foun­da­tion where she now sits on the Board of Trustees.

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    Favorite Tree

    Kat­sura tree
    (Cer­cidi­phyl­lum japon­icum)

Megan Hig­gins Palomo
Her­itage Nurs­ery Director

As the Her­itage Nurs­ery Direc­tor, Megan is respon­si­ble for devel­op­ing and man­ag­ing all aspects of Tree Pitts­burgh’s Her­itage Nurs­ery, which works to address the issue of for­est bio­di­ver­si­ty by grow­ing a diverse tree stock for local plant­i­ngs and ecosys­tem restora­tion efforts. Megan over­sees all prop­a­ga­tion and sales efforts, and man­ages the nurs­ery vol­un­teer pro­gram. From seed col­lec­tion to the con­tin­ued pro­duc­tion of nurs­ery stock, she works to ensure the high­est qual­i­ty stan­dards by using cur­rent best man­age­ment practices.

Pri­or to join­ing Tree Pitts­burgh in Novem­ber 2014, Megan served as the Busi­ness Devel­op­ment and Design Man­ag­er at Phipps Con­ser­va­to­ry and Botan­i­cal Gar­dens where she led the orga­ni­za­tion’s sus­tain­abil­i­ty con­sult­ing ini­tia­tives. Megan learned the nurs­ery trade by work­ing along­side her father for many years at their fam­i­ly-owned nurs­ery busi­ness, Michael Broth­ers in West Deer, PA. She earned her B.S. in Land­scape Archi­tec­ture with a con­cen­tra­tion in Hor­ti­cul­ture from Cor­nell Uni­ver­si­ty in 2007.

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    Favorite Tree

    Black gum
    (Nys­sa syl­vat­i­ca)

Jake Milof­sky
Direc­tor of Tree Care and Reforestation

As Direc­tor of Tree Care and Refor­esta­tion, Jake over­sees tree main­te­nance oper­a­tions in the field. Work­ing with vol­un­teer groups and sea­son­al staff, Jake coor­di­nates projects to keep street trees healthy in com­mer­cial and indus­tri­al por­tions of the city where there is lit­tle Tree Ten­der support.

In res­i­den­tial areas where there is Tree Ten­der sup­port, Jake works direct­ly with neigh­bor­hood Tree Ten­ders to sched­ule and sup­port their com­mu­ni­ties’ tree care through reg­u­lar events like Mulching Par­ties and Prun­ing Workshops.

Jake is also in charge of Tree Pitts­burgh’s refor­esta­tion projects along green­ways where the tree canopy has been impact­ed by inva­sive species. To advance these projects, Jake orga­nizes vol­un­teers and staff to plant new trees and main­tain these sites.

Jake holds a BA in Envi­ron­men­tal Stud­ies from Buck­nell Uni­ver­si­ty and a Mas­ter’s Degree in Envi­ron­men­tal Hor­ti­cul­ture and Eco­log­i­cal Restora­tion from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Wash­ing­ton in Seattle.

Jake is an ISA Cer­ti­fied Arborist and an active mem­ber of the Pennsylvania/Delaware Chap­ter of the ISA.

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    Favorite Tree

    White Oak
    (Quer­cus alba)

Joe Stavish
Direc­tor of Education

Joe helps to coor­di­nate the Tree Ten­der Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion cours­es for adults as well as many youth pro­grams in the com­mu­ni­ty. Joe sched­ules and/or teach­es many pro­grams includ­ing gar­den club talks, vis­its to schools, sum­mer camps, host­ing scout pro­grams, tabling at fes­ti­vals, lead­ing tree iden­ti­fi­ca­tion walks, and host­ing nurs­ery tours. He has pre­sent­ed at nation­al and region­al con­fer­ences includ­ing the Arbor Day Foun­da­tion’s Part­ners in Com­mu­ni­ty Forestry Con­fer­ence, and the Penn­syl­va­nia Delaware chap­ter of the Amer­i­can Soci­ety of Land­scape Archi­tects. He has instruct­ed facil­i­ties and grounds crew train­ings at uni­ver­si­ties includ­ing Carnegie Mel­lon Uni­ver­si­ty, Chatham Uni­ver­si­ty, and the Uni­ver­si­ty of Pitts­burgh. He is pas­sion­ate about nature and incor­po­rates insects, birds, amphib­ians, and mam­mals into many of the pro­grams he facilitates.

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    Favorite Tree

    Palm tree
    (Are­caceae)

Kelsey Small
Chief Finan­cial Officer

Kelsey Small is the shared Chief Finan­cial Offi­cer for the Envi­ron­men­tal Finance Col­lab­o­ra­tive with finan­cial respon­si­bil­i­ties for five orga­ni­za­tions: Alleghe­ny Coun­ty Con­ser­va­tion Dis­trict, Con­struc­tion Junc­tion, Ground­ed, Nine Mile Run Water­shed Asso­ci­a­tion and Tree Pitts­burgh. Kelsey is respon­si­ble for pro­vid­ing oper­a­tional finan­cial exper­tise and over­sight, bud­get­ing and busi­ness plan­ning, and adop­tion of best prac­tices in finan­cial management.

Most recent­ly Kelsey was the Inter­im Direc­tor of Finance and Admin­is­tra­tion for the Carnegie Muse­um of Art, where she over­saw finan­cial, fundrais­ing, and orga­ni­za­tion­al plan­ning ini­tia­tives. Kelsey holds a Mas­ter of Arts Man­age­ment Degree from Carnegie Mel­lon Uni­ver­si­ty and a Bachelor’s degree in Busi­ness from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Florida.

Out­side of the office, Kelsey enjoys explor­ing the city parks, bak­ing, and gardening.

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    Favorite Tree

    Birch
    (Betu­la)

Mau­ra O’Neill
Direc­tor of Devel­op­ment and Communications

As Direc­tor of Devel­op­ment and Com­mu­ni­ca­tions, Mau­ra is respon­si­ble for over­see­ing fundrais­ing, grant writ­ing, com­mu­ni­ca­tions and mar­ket­ing at Tree Pitts­burgh as well as help­ing to expand our edu­ca­tion pro­grams. Pri­or to Tree Pitts­burgh, Mau­ra man­aged fundrais­ing and mar­ket­ing pro­grams at pub­lic media and health devel­op­ment organizations.

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    Favorite Tree

    Tulip Poplar
    (Liri­o­den­dron tulip­ifera)

Mag­gie Aupperlee
Mar­ket­ing and Com­mu­ni­ca­tions Manager

As Man­ag­er of Mar­ket­ing and Com­mu­ni­ca­tions, Mag­gie is respon­si­ble for all of Tree Pitts­burgh’s com­mu­ni­ca­tions includ­ing social media, press releas­es, and email newslet­ters. She also serves as a sup­port for devel­op­ment and fundrais­ing events.

Mag­gie came to Pitts­burgh in the fall of 2010 to par­tic­i­pate in the Pitts­burgh Urban Lead­er­ship Ser­vice Expe­ri­ence. She spent 7 years run­ning her own non­prof­it com­mu­ni­ca­tions firm, work­ing with local, region­al, and nation­al nonprofits.

When she’s not at Tree Pitts­burgh, Mag­gie likes to bake and play with her ener­getic dog. You can prob­a­bly find her camp­ing in Penn­syl­va­ni­a’s state parks.

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    Favorite Tree

    Crabap­ple
    (Malus sylvestris)

Kathi Radock
Oper­a­tions Manager

Kathi joined Tree Pitts­burgh in the fall of 2022 as our Oper­a­tions Man­ag­er. Her pri­ma­ry respon­si­bil­i­ty is to ensure orga­ni­za­tion­al effec­tive­ness by pro­vid­ing sup­port for the orga­ni­za­tion’s admin­is­tra­tive func­tions. Kathi also con­tributes to the devel­op­ment and imple­men­ta­tion of orga­ni­za­tion­al strate­gies, poli­cies and prac­tices, and serves a lead­ing role in inspir­ing a pos­i­tive and sup­port­ive orga­ni­za­tion­al culture.

Kathi has worked for non­prof­its in the arts, pub­lic radio, and out­door recre­ation. Most recent­ly, Kathi worked at a local com­mu­ni­ty devel­op­ment orga­ni­za­tion work­ing in com­mu­ni­ca­tions and oper­a­tions, and she brings that expe­ri­ence to Tree Pitts­burgh. She has a BA in Eng­lish and Film Studies.

In Kathi’s spare time, she loves to read, go antiquing, bike, and spend time with her wife and dog. She’s a part of her neigh­bor­hood block watch, which includes the impor­tant task of pick­ing up litter!

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    Favorite Tree

    Coast red­wood
    (Sequoia sem­per­virens)

Matt Stanko
Nurs­ery Oper­a­tions Manager

Matt joined Tree Pitts­burgh in 2019. As Nurs­ery Oper­a­tions Man­ag­er, Matt is a part of all things Her­itage Nurs­ery. This means he is instru­men­tal in trans­plant­i­ng, water­ing, and weed­ing plants as well as col­lect­ing and pro­cess­ing seeds.

Matt is an Air Force Vet­er­an and an Eagle Scout. He had 10 years of res­i­den­tial tree care and removal expe­ri­ence before join­ing Tree Pittsburgh.

When he’s not car­ing for the trees, Matt is an avid back­pack­er, cyclist, and kayaker.

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    Favorite Tree

    Oak
    (Quer­cus)

Clara Kiton­go
Tree Equi­ty Manager

Clara has tran­si­tioned from her role as One Tree Per Child Pro­gram Man­ag­er to the new­ly cre­at­ed role of Tree Equi­ty Man­ag­er. She will work with com­mu­ni­ties, espe­cial­ly those with low canopy or Envi­ron­men­tal Jus­tice com­mu­ni­ties, to be sure their voic­es and wish­es are heard through­out our plan­ning process­es. She is a Mas­ter of Pub­lic Pol­i­cy Man­age­ment grad­u­ate from the Heinz School of Pub­lic Pol­i­cy and Infor­ma­tion Sys­tems at Carnegie Mel­lon Uni­ver­si­ty. She has gath­ered a diverse array of skills through her work­ing career as a for­mer teacher, sus­tain­abil­i­ty fel­low with the Stu­dent Con­ser­va­tion Asso­ci­a­tion, pro­gram coor­di­na­tor at CMU, and a pol­i­cy intern with the City of Pitts­burgh. She also sup­ports local vol­un­teer ini­tia­tives and is a cer­ti­fied Tree Ten­der with us!

When she’s not at work, Clara loves to be out­doors. She loves to take walks in the park and ride her bike on a good sum­mer or fall evening. She is also an in-house musi­cian, so be on the look­out for some work from her soon!

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    Favorite Tree

    Quak­ing aspen
    (Pop­u­lus tremu­loides)

Loralyn Fabi­an
Tree Adop­tion Pro­gram Manager

Loralyn joined Tree Pitts­burgh in 2022 to man­age the Tree Adop­tion pro­gram, which pro­vides trees to res­i­dents of Alleghe­ny Coun­ty at no cost. Loralyn has a back­ground in com­mu­ni­ty devel­op­ment, engage­ment, and green­ing projects.

Loralyn’s love for nature start­ed at a young age, hik­ing and bik­ing with her fam­i­ly. This grew into a desire to pro­tect and restore nat­ur­al envi­ron­ments. As Tree Adop­tion Pro­gram Man­ag­er, Loralyn is able to blend her skills in plan­ning and strat­e­gy, her love of nature and the urban for­est, and her expe­ri­ence in com­mu­ni­ty engage­ments and partnerships.

Loralyn holds a BLA in Land­scape Archi­tec­ture from Penn State Uni­ver­si­ty. When she’s not at work, you can find her hik­ing and back­pack­ing, recharg­ing in nature, and spend­ing time illus­trat­ing and drawing.

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    Favorite Tree

    Shag­bark hickory
    (Carya ova­ta)

Kurt Carl­son
Facil­i­ties Manager

As Facil­i­ties Man­ag­er, Kurt does it all. He is a jack of all trades build­ing our robot lawn mow­er (yes, a robot mows our court­yard!), build­ing pot­ting bench­es for the Her­itage Nurs­ery, and gen­er­al­ly fix­ing all of the things that need to be fixed around cam­pus. Kurt has also been instru­men­tal in steer­ing Tree Pitts­burgh toward a zero-waste facility.

Through­out Kurt’s pro­fes­sion­al career, he has worked as a writer and edi­tor for Thrash­er Mag­a­zine, com­put­er mag­a­zines, and even video game instruc­tion man­u­als. He began to use his var­ied skillset to fix peo­ples’ hous­es, which led him to join Tree Pittsburgh.

Kurt enjoys camp­ing, play­ing board and card games, and doing house projects when he’s not at Tree Pittsburgh.

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    Favorite Tree

    Coast red­wood
    (Sequoia sem­per­virens)

Jamie Gruzin­s­ki
Tree Care and Refor­esta­tion Project Manager

As the Tree Care and Refor­esta­tion Project Coor­di­na­tor, Jamie trains sea­son­al field staff and man­ages com­mu­ni­ty tree care and plant­i­ng projects. With inter­ests in urban forestry and ter­res­tri­al ecol­o­gy, Jamie pro­vides a unique per­spec­tive in the effort to grow Pittsburgh’s urban forest.

Jamie orig­i­nal­ly joined Tree Pitts­burgh in 2016 as a sea­son­al mem­ber of the Sum­mer Tree Care Crew, but his role devel­oped into a long-term posi­tion as a Pro­gram Assis­tant. He briefly left Tree Pitts­burgh in 2019 to gain more expe­ri­ence in arbori­cul­ture, but is now back to train the next gen­er­a­tion of arborists and neigh­bor­hood Tree Tenders.

Jamie holds a BS in Envi­ron­men­tal Biol­o­gy from Clar­i­on Uni­ver­si­ty with work expe­ri­ence in mul­ti­ple dis­ci­plines that span across non­prof­its, pri­vate busi­ness­es, and city government.

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    Favorite Tree

    Euro­pean Cop­per Beech
    (Fagus syl­vat­i­ca)

Kelsey Mun­sick
Tree Ten­der Pro­gram Manager

Kelsey joined Tree Pitts­burgh in 2021 and has tran­si­tioned from her orig­i­nal role as Com­mu­ni­ty Tree Spe­cial­ist to the new­ly cre­at­ed Tree Ten­der Pro­gram Man­ag­er. In this posi­tion, Kelsey will work direct­ly with our ded­i­cat­ed Tree Ten­ders and oth­er volunteers.

Pri­or to work­ing with Tree Pitts­burgh, Kelsey was an Alleghe­ny Coun­ty Park Ranger. In her role as an edu­ca­tion­al inter­pre­tive ranger, her role was to lead hikes and trail projects, includ­ing tree plant­i­ng projects with Tree Pitts­burgh. Her intern­ship with Grey Tow­ers His­tor­i­cal site with the US For­est Ser­vice inspired her to pur­sue a career in envi­ron­men­tal con­ser­va­tion. She holds a bach­e­lor’s degree in Parks and Recre­ation from Cal­i­for­nia Uni­ver­si­ty of Penn­syl­va­nia and a mas­ter’s degree in Park & Resource Man­age­ment from Slip­pery Rock University.

When she’s not in the com­mu­ni­ty work­ing on trees, she enjoys gar­den­ing, tak­ing her dog for walks in South Park, and serv­ing as the cap­tain for her Rag­nar run­ning team.

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    Favorite Tree

    Mimosa
    (Albizia julib­rissin)

Kim­ber­ly Bracken
Giv­ing Grove Manager

Kim­ber­ly is the Giv­ing Grove Man­ag­er at Tree Pitts­burgh. She helps to launch new fruit orchards in the region and pro­vides sup­port to exist­ing com­mu­ni­ty gardens/orchards. Kim­ber­ly also helps to facil­i­tate the shar­ing and dis­tri­b­u­tion of Giv­ing Grove fruits, nuts, and berries.

Kim­ber­ly grad­u­at­ed from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Pitts­burgh and has a cer­tifi­cate in per­ma­cul­ture design from Phipps Con­ser­va­to­ry. She got involved in gar­den­ing by join­ing the Old Alleghe­ny Com­mu­ni­ty Gar­den. She wrote grants and designed gar­dens for the Chil­dren’s Muse­um and Food City Com­mu­ni­ty Gar­den, a quar­ter-acre food for­est on Tripoli Street on the North Side.

Kim­ber­ly is an avid bicy­cler. In her free time, she likes to cook, read, quilt, write let­ters, paper­cut­ting, and play board games.

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    Favorite Tree

    Chinkapin oak
    (Quer­cus muehlen­bergii)

Jonathan Fan­tazier
One Tree Per Child Pro­gram Manager

Jonathan joined Tree Pitts­burgh in 2023 as Pro­gram Man­ag­er for One Tree Per Child. Through this role Jonathan serves stu­dents through the K‑12 age range in learn­ing about trees, for­est & urban ecol­o­gy, cli­mate sci­ence, and envi­ron­men­tal health.

Pri­or to join­ing Tree Pitts­burgh in August 2023, Jonathan taught in the Pitts­burgh Pub­lic Schools as well as oth­er inde­pen­dent, char­ter, Montes­sori, and reli­gious schools. He has a BS in Tech­ni­cal Writ­ing from Carnegie Mel­lon Uni­ver­si­ty and earned a MA in Teach­ing from Chatham Uni­ver­si­ty, with dual cer­ti­fi­ca­tions in sec­ondary Eng­lish and math­e­mat­ics. Jonathan has con­tin­ued his edu­ca­tion through sev­er­al cur­ricu­lum devel­op­ment fel­low­ships, and cer­ti­fi­ca­tions in Per­ma­cul­ture Design and Hor­ti­cul­ture. Beyond his work with Tree Pitts­burgh, Jonathan is the Sec­re­tary for the Board of Direc­tors of the PLEA behav­ioral health agency.

Jonathan is a bik­er, run­ner, swim­mer, boater, mar­tial artist, and an art, music, & food enthu­si­ast. You may see him out with his part­ner bird watch­ing, look­ing for fos­sils, or for­ag­ing for mush­rooms in our city, coun­ty, and state parks.

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    Favorite Tree

    Red maple
    (Acer rubrum)

Maeve Raf­fer­ty
Edu­ca­tion Coordinator

Maeve serves as Tree Pitts­burgh’s Edu­ca­tion Coor­di­na­tor, but this isn’t her first time on staff! Her cur­rent role, which began in 2021, involves cre­at­ing edu­ca­tion­al pro­gram­ming and sup­port­ing edu­ca­tion efforts across all Tree Pitts­burgh pro­grams. Pre­vi­ous­ly, Maeve has worked in our Her­itage Nurs­ery for 5 years and on the win­ter prun­ing crew for 2.

Maeve stud­ied envi­ron­men­tal biol­o­gy at Uni­ver­si­ty Col­lege Dublin and spent a decade work­ing in nature con­ser­va­tion in North­ern Ire­land. She moved to Pitts­burgh in 2010 and was drawn to the city’s trees.

Out­side of the office, Maeve enjoys learn­ing more about the diver­si­ty of plant life by hik­ing in the forests, fields, and off-beat­en paths in Pitts­burgh. She’s also an active mem­ber of the Lawrenceville Tree Ten­ders and helps to main­tain the Lawrenceville Tree Park.

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    Favorite Tree

    East­ern hemlock
    (Tsuga canaden­sis)

Ter­ra Nonack
Event Rental Coordinator

Ter­ra is a famil­iar face around Tree Pitts­burgh, hav­ing worked in var­i­ous capac­i­ties before tak­ing on the role of Event Rental Coor­di­na­tor. Ter­ra meets with every inter­est­ed rental client and han­dles all book­ing, staffing, and coor­di­na­tion of ven­dor dropoffs and pick­ups. Along with Kurt, Ter­ra has steered us toward zero waste in the office as well as pro­vid­ing that oppor­tu­ni­ty for event rentals as well. She also plays anoth­er cru­cial role on staff: keep­ing our build­ing clean!

Ter­ra is a Mas­ter Gar­den­er, who used to grow and sell her own organ­ic pro­duce at farmer’s mar­kets. She has a pas­sion for sus­tain­abil­i­ty, hav­ing lived on a sus­tain­able farm grow­ing up. Through her expe­ri­ence in the ser­vice indus­try, she devel­oped a pas­sion for tak­ing care of peo­ple and mak­ing sure peo­ple have what they need.

Out­side of work, she enjoys gar­den­ing, camp­ing, hik­ing, and hang­ing out with her kids.

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    Favorite Tree

    Tulip poplar
    (Liri­o­den­dron tulip­ifera)

Devin Ehrlich
Urban For­est Technician

Devin spends his days at Tree Pitts­burgh out­side, plant­i­ng and car­ing for young trees across Alleghe­ny Coun­ty. As our Urban For­est Tech­ni­cian, he sup­ports all of our tree care and tree plant­i­ng pro­grams, includ­ing One Tree Per Child and activ­i­ties with­in our ReLeaf communities.

Devin comes to Tree Pitts­burgh after com­plet­ing the Hor­ti­cul­ture Tech­nol­o­gy Pro­gram at Bid­well Train­ing Cen­ter and an extern­ship at Beech­wood Farms. He’s always been inter­est­ed in nature, start­ing with his time at sum­mer camp. Work­ing at Tree Pitts­burgh pro­vides Devin the oppor­tu­ni­ty to get out in the city and get­ting to know it bet­ter, and to explore new places.

Devin loves to spend his free time hik­ing and read­ing about nature and phi­los­o­phy. He is a stu­dent of life.

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    Favorite Tree

    Tulip poplar
    (Liri­o­den­dron tulipifera)

Alliy Gund­lach
Her­itage Nurs­ery Seed Technician

Alliy joins the team as our Seed Tech­ni­cian in the Her­itage Nurs­ery. Alliy col­lects all of the tree and shrub seeds for our nurs­ery pro­gram. She scouts new col­lec­tion loca­tions, col­lects seeds respon­si­bly, and cat­a­logs them appro­pri­ate­ly. She also cleans and pre­pares seeds for strat­i­fi­ca­tion and plant­i­ng in the spring.

Alliy’s back­ground includes a con­ser­va­tion biol­o­gy degree from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Cen­tral Flori­da. She has worked for the US Fish & Wildlife Ser­vice and The Nature Con­ser­van­cy doing plant stud­ies. She then came back to Pitts­burgh and spent time in retail grow­ing before join­ing our team right at the start of the busy seed col­lec­tion season!

When she’s not at the office, Alliy spends time play­ing in the moun­tains includ­ing adven­ture sports, climb­ing, back­pack­ing, and endurance runs. She also enjoys veg­etable gardening.

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    Favorite Tree

    Tulip poplar
    (Liri­o­den­dron tulip­ifera)

Meg Har­ris
Nurs­ery Hor­ti­cul­ture Technician

Meg is our Hor­ti­cul­ture Tech­ni­cian in the Her­itage Nurs­ery. Pre­vi­ous­ly, Meg was an Envi­ron­men­tal Edu­ca­tor at the Pitts­burgh Parks Con­ser­van­cy. She has a degree in envi­ron­men­tal sci­ence from Chatham University.

As our Hor­ti­cul­ture Tech­ni­cian, Meg spends her days in the nurs­ery car­ing for young trees and shrubs. This includes plant­i­ng and up-pot­ting seedlings, mon­i­tor­ing soil, inte­grat­ed pest man­age­ment, and gen­er­al main­te­nance of our thou­sands of con­tainer­ized trees. When you vol­un­teer at the Her­itage Nurs­ery, you will def­i­nite­ly meet Meg!

When she’s not at Tree Pitts­burgh, you can still find Meg out­side in nature (look for her in a ham­mock in the parks). She also enjoys trav­el­ing and makes sure to go on a hike in each state she visits.

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    Favorite Tree

    Bigleaf mag­no­lia
    (Mag­no­lia macro­phyl­la)

Mel Bryan
Urban For­est Technician

After join­ing Tree Pitts­burgh in a sea­son­al role in 2022, Mel “offi­cial­ly” joined us in 2023 as an Urban For­est Tech­ni­cian. Mel has a back­ground in visu­al arts and a BFA from Carnegie Mel­lon Uni­ver­si­ty. They devel­oped an inter­est in nature dur­ing their time in col­lege, which led them to join Land­force in 2020 and then Tree Pitts­burgh in 2022.

As an Urban For­est Tech­ni­cian, Mel works on sev­er­al teams to grow our urban for­est! You’ll see them at Tree Adop­tions, tree plant­i­ngs, and tree care events around the city.

Out­side of their work with Tree Pitts­burgh, Mel enjoys bik­ing around and explor­ing the city, and work­ing on craft and mend­ing projects.

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    Favorite Tree

    White oak
    (Quer­cus alba)

Oak­lee
Mas­cot, Greeter, All-Around Fun Bringer

Oak­lee start­ed at Tree Pitts­burgh in the fall of 2017, help­ing with fam­i­ly sto­ry time at Arbor Aid and Paw­paw Fest. At Tree Pitts­burgh, it’s Oak­lee’s job to make events more fun. Some might say Oak­lee is just a mas­cot, but we know Oak­lee brings so much more to the orga­ni­za­tion. Be on the look­out for Oak­lee at Tree Pitts­burgh events around Alleghe­ny County!

A native of the oak trees on Flagstaff Hill in Schen­ley Park, Oak­lee recent­ly moved to Lawrenceville to work for Tree Pitts­burgh. In their spare time, Oak­lee climbs trees, jumps fences, and eats nuts and berries.

Board of Directors

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Michael Zimmerman, Chair

Michael Zim­mer­man grew up in Ver­mont and is proud to call Pitts­burgh his home since 2017. He joined the board of Tree Pitts­burgh in 2018, serv­ing as Trea­sur­er and now Chair. He works as the Man­ag­er & Assis­tant Gen­er­al Coun­sel of Reg­u­la­to­ry Law at Duquesne Light Com­pa­ny, where he sup­ports a range of pro­grams includ­ing clean ener­gy devel­op­ment and trans­porta­tion elec­tri­fi­ca­tion. Mike holds a B.A. from Wes­leyan Uni­ver­si­ty in Mid­dle­town, CT, and a J.D. from Ford­ham Law School in New York. He lives in Lawrenceville with his wife, cat, and a thriv­ing pin oak tree.
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Matt Plecity, Vice Chair

An archi­tect with a land­scape archi­tec­ture back­ground, Matt (AIA, ASLA) has worked on sev­er­al notable Pitts­burgh land­marks includ­ing the Envi­ron­men­tal Cen­ter at Frick Park, the Tow­er at PNC Plaza, Hill­man Library at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Pitts­burgh, and Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh’s Library of Acces­si­ble Media for Penn­syl­va­ni­ans (LAMP). Matt first began col­lab­o­rat­ing with Tree Pitts­burgh design­ing the net-zero ener­gy head­quar­ters and fell in love with the orga­ni­za­tion and its mis­sion. On week­ends, Matt is fre­quent­ly found enjoy­ing Pittsburgh’s parks with his wife and four daugh­ters. Matt’s favorite tree is the dou­glas fir.
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Isabela Cajiao-Angelelli, Secretary

Orig­i­nal­ly from Colom­bia, South Amer­i­ca, where she attend­ed Med­ical School at the Jave­ri­ana Uni­ver­si­ty School of Med­i­cine, Dr. Angelel­li com­plet­ed her Pedi­atric Res­i­den­cy Train­ing at the UPMC Children’s Hos­pi­tal of Pitts­burgh (CHP). She has expe­ri­ence in emer­gency med­i­cine and is cur­rent­ly the Direc­tor of the CHP Pedi­atric Seda­tion Ser­vice. She is also a com­mu­ni­ty and envi­ron­men­tal health advo­cate. She serves as the Direc­tor for the UPMC CHP Green Team and as a mem­ber of the UPMC Envi­ron­men­tal Ini­tia­tives Com­mit­tee. The cur­rent focus of her work in the envi­ron­men­tal world includes trees as a pub­lic health inter­ven­tion and efforts to decrease the car­bon foot­print of region­al health­care sys­tems. She is the Co-Founder of Tree Pittsburgh’s One Tree Per Child Pitts­burgh Pro­gram. She is also the Co-Founder and Co-Chair of Clin­i­cians for Cli­mate Action, a group of UPMC clin­i­cians sup­port­ing the health­care sys­tem in decar­boniz­ing its oper­a­tions and imple­ment­ing more sus­tain­able practices.
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Anne Franks, Treasurer

Anne retired from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Pitts­burgh Office of Insti­tu­tion­al Advance­ment where she served as the Exec­u­tive Direc­tor of Admin­is­tra­tion and EIR to the Berg Cen­ter for Ethics and Lead­er­ship. She holds an M.Ed. from Pitt and is a trained medi­a­tor, a Mas­ter Gar­den­er, Tree Ten­der, and For­est Stew­ard. She is cur­rent­ly engaged in non-prof­it con­sult­ing and exec­u­tive coach­ing. As a life­long tree hug­ger and envi­ron­men­tal­ist, Anne joined the board because she want­ed to use her time, pas­sion, and skills to help Tree Pitts­burgh increase its capac­i­ty to impact the region. She has camped, hiked, and trav­eled all over North Amer­i­ca; out-of-doors is where Anne loves to be. Anne enjoys spend­ing time in her gar­den and a shared com­mu­ni­ty gar­den, walk­ing in High­land Park and around the city. Anne’s favorite trees are the East­ern Red­bud and the Coastal Redwood.
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Justin Berk

Justin is an Asso­ciate at Schnei­der Downs Cor­po­rate Finance, LP where he is pri­mar­i­ly respon­si­ble for trans­ac­tion exe­cu­tion and busi­ness devel­op­ment for the firm’s real estate invest­ment bank­ing prac­tice. His activ­i­ties focus on rais­ing equi­ty for sta­bi­lized assets and projects under devel­op­ment across a vari­ety of asset class­es. Justin grad­u­at­ed from the George Wash­ing­ton Uni­ver­si­ty in 2017 and is cur­rent­ly in the process of obtain­ing his Mas­ters Degree in real estate finance and devel­op­ment from George­town Uni­ver­si­ty. A Pitts­burgh native, Justin resides in Swis­shelm Park with his wife (Talia) and pup­py (Rid­er). Justin is pas­sion­ate about Pitts­burgh and enjoys explor­ing nature with his wife and pup­py, attend­ing live music con­certs, play­ing sports, and engag­ing with his com­mu­ni­ty. In addi­tion to serv­ing on the Board of Direc­tors and Finance Com­mit­tee for Tree Pitts­burgh, Justin also serves on the Board of Direc­tors for Squir­rel Hill Urban Coalition.
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Sam Chan

Sam is the Assis­tant Direc­tor of Sus­tain­abil­i­ty for the Office of Sus­tain­abil­i­ty at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Pitts­burgh. She works with the Pitt Sus­tain­abil­i­ty team, pro­vid­ing strate­gic sup­port to help Pitt advance its 68 sus­tain­abil­i­ty goals along with becom­ing car­bon neu­tral by 2037. Her pro­fes­sion­al expe­ri­ence includes per­form­ing embod­ied ener­gy cal­cu­la­tions on recy­cling tech­niques for fiber com­pos­ite epoxy lam­i­nate, pub­lic health research, wildlife con­ser­va­tion, and bio­philic resilien­cy ini­tia­tives that ben­e­fit both peo­ple and plan­et. Sam has a Mas­ter’s of Sus­tain­abil­i­ty from Chatham Uni­ver­si­ty. Sam joined Tree Pitts­burgh in 2023 because she is pas­sion­ate about grow­ing our urban tree canopy and achiev­ing envi­ron­men­tal health ben­e­fits for our region by expand­ing green spaces. Sam’s favorite tree is the quak­ing aspen because of its fas­ci­nat­ing abil­i­ty to clone itself.
darla

Darla Cravotta

In 2005, Dar­la Cravot­ta worked to spear­head a tree-plant­i­ng pro­gram at Lib­er­ty School, where her son attend­ed grade school. In part­ner­ship with the neigh­bors and the Pitts­burgh Pub­lic School Dis­trict, the kids plant­ed 14 trees, thanks to Tree Pitts­burgh’s gen­eros­i­ty, reduc­ing the heat island effect on the play­ground area. Addi­tion­al­ly, the funds the chil­dren raised were donat­ed to Tree Pitts­burgh for main­te­nance of the school­yard trees. The long-term rela­tion­ship with Tree Pitts­burgh was­n’t new, at one point in her young life, Dar­la was a cham­pi­on tree climber! A ded­i­cat­ed pub­lic employ­ee, Dar­la is cur­rent­ly employed by Alleghe­ny Coun­ty in the coun­ty exec­u­tive’s office. Past work includes work­ing for coun­ty exec­u­tive Dan Ono­ra­to and man­ag­ing neigh­bor­hood pol­i­cy for for­mer Pitts­burgh May­or Tom Mur­phy. She also has been Man­ag­er of Out­reach for the Carnegie Library of Pitts­burgh and Com­mu­ni­ty Plan­ner for South­west­ern PA for the Nation­al Parks Ser­vice and Rivers, Trails, and Con­ser­va­tion Assis­tance Pro­gram. Dar­la loves all of the trees, espe­cial­ly when she walks in the woods, sits in the forests, or spends time in one of our amaz­ing parks.
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Kevin Gieder

Kevin Gieder is a Pitts­burgh-based con­sul­tant pro­vid­ing CFO ser­vices, finan­cial man­age­ment re-engi­neer­ing, man­age­ment coach­ing, and strate­gic project-based work to non-prof­it orga­ni­za­tions and char­i­ta­ble foun­da­tions. Kevin brings 20+ years of expe­ri­ence work­ing with Pittsburgh’s non-prof­it sec­tor first as a board mem­ber, then a shared CFO for a cohort of 5 orga­ni­za­tions, and now as a con­sul­tant. Kevin is excit­ed to bring his skills and exper­tise serv­ing to Tree’s Pitts­burgh board so that the orga­ni­za­tion can enhance and pre­serve our urban for­est. Kevin’s favorite tree is the thriv­ing Amer­i­can elm tree in his backyard.
wes

Wesley Kanawalsky

Wes­ley is an envi­ron­men­tal pro­fes­sion­al with over 18 years of expe­ri­ence in the trans­porta­tion indus­try. Cur­rent­ly serv­ing as the Sus­tain­abil­i­ty Project Man­ag­er for FedEx Ground, Wes­ley brings a wealth of knowl­edge in cor­po­rate sus­tain­abil­i­ty strat­e­gy, includ­ing exper­tise in car­bon emis­sions reduc­tion and elec­tric vehi­cle deploy­ment. With a BA from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Cincin­nati and cer­tifi­cates from Chi­ang Mai Uni­ver­si­ty (Thai­land), Wayne State Uni­ver­si­ty, and Har­vard Busi­ness School Online, Wes­ley is ded­i­cat­ed to advanc­ing sus­tain­abil­i­ty in busi­ness­es and com­mu­ni­ties. Pas­sion­ate about envi­ron­men­tal con­ser­va­tion, Wes­ley joined the board of Tree Pitts­burgh in 2023 fol­low­ing sev­er­al years of ded­i­cat­ed vol­un­teer ser­vice. He was drawn to Tree Pitts­burgh’s impact­ful mis­sion, com­mu­ni­ty-focused ini­tia­tives, and excep­tion­al staff mem­bers. Wes­ley finds ful­fill­ment in wit­ness­ing the beau­ty and growth of trees plant­ed by Tree Pitts­burgh, enhanc­ing parks, lin­ing trails, and con­tribut­ing to the over­all well-being of neigh­bor­hoods. Beyond his pro­fes­sion­al pur­suits, Wes­ley enjoys spend­ing qual­i­ty time with his fam­i­ly, rais­ing two ram­bunc­tious young boys, and explor­ing the great out­doors. He is an avid hik­er and camper, seek­ing any oppor­tu­ni­ty to immerse him­self in nature. Wes­ley’s per­son­al inter­ests align with his pro­fes­sion­al endeav­ors, demon­strat­ing his ded­i­ca­tion to envi­ron­men­tal stew­ard­ship and a well-round­ed approach to life, com­ple­ment­ing his love for Pitts­burgh and com­mit­ment to sus­tain­abil­i­ty. Wesley’s favorite tree is the red maple.
milliron

Eric Milliron

Eric Mil­l­iron is the Eco­nom­ic Devel­op­ment Man­ag­er for the Munic­i­pal­i­ty of Mt. Lebanon. He has been in this posi­tion for fif­teen years. Pri­or to serv­ing in Mt. Lebanon, Eric was work­ing for Alleghe­ny Coun­ty Eco­nom­ic Devel­op­ment and both the North­side and South Sides of Pitts­burgh. He is a grad­u­ate of the Uni­ver­si­ty of Pitts­burgh with a degree in Urban Plan­ning. Eric joined Tree Pitts­burgh to give back to the region in the best way pos­si­ble — expand­ing the urban tree canopy. When not work­ing, Eric can be found hik­ing, back­pack­ing, or kayak­ing through­out the forests of Penn­syl­va­nia, the Pacif­ic North­west, and North­ern Cal­i­for­nia. His favorite native Penn­syl­van­ian tree is the hem­lock, but most favorite of all is the mighty redwood.
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John Oliverio

John is an EVP, Human Resources for True­Sense Mar­ket­ing. John leads all HR func­tions, orga­ni­za­tion­al strat­e­gy, admin­is­tra­tion, and teams for over 500 employ­ees locat­ed through­out the US. The mis­sion of Tree Pitts­burgh is what drove him to get involved with the orga­ni­za­tion through tree plant­i­ngs, Tree Ten­der train­ing, Tree ID walks, seed sem­i­nars, spe­cial events, etc. He want­ed to do more for the orga­ni­za­tion and serv­ing on the board was an impor­tant step for him. He enjoys inter­act­ing with the staff, vol­un­teers, board mem­bers, and all the peo­ple involved with the orga­ni­za­tion that under­stands the impor­tance of a strong tree canopy. John’s favorite tree is the quak­ing aspen.
ramage

Mary Ellen Ramage

Mary Ellen is the Man­ag­er for the town of Etna Bor­ough. She was a found­ing mem­ber of, and cur­rent Chair­per­son of the North Hills Coun­cil of Gov­ern­ments Stormwa­ter Man­age­ment Com­mit­tee and serves on the Alcosan Advi­so­ry Board. She serves as the Trea­sur­er of CONNECT, a mul­ti-munic­i­pal col­lab­o­ra­tion between the City of Pitts­burgh and the urban core com­mu­ni­ties bor­der­ing our city. She was part of the team which spear­head­ed the Etna EcoDis­trict process and is proud that Etna became the first cer­ti­fied EcoDis­trict in the world. Sus­tain­abil­i­ty, envi­ron­men­tal stew­ard­ship, and equi­ty dri­ve her to work with these orga­ni­za­tions and projects and Tree Pittsburgh’s mis­sion and work fit in per­fect­ly with her pas­sion, val­ues, and work. Tree Pittsburgh’s cur­rent dri­ve to bring tree equi­ty to so many under­served areas inspires her great­ly. Her favorite tree is the Cal­i­for­nia red­wood whose mas­sive height speaks to the won­der of nature and our nat­ur­al world.
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