PT - JOURNAL ARTICLE AU - Keith O’Herrin AU - Patricia Shields TI - Assessing Municipal Forestry Activity: A Survey of Home-Rule Municipalities in Texas, U.S. AID - 10.48044/jauf.2016.025 DP - 2016 Jul 01 TA - Arboriculture & Urban Forestry (AUF) PG - 267--280 VI - 42 IP - 4 4099 - http://auf.isa-arbor.com/content/42/4/267.short 4100 - http://auf.isa-arbor.com/content/42/4/267.full AB - Municipal forestry programs in the United States have been the subject of dozens of surveys over the past 40 years that offer valuable insight into what is occurring now and act as a point of reference in the future. Researchers surveyed home-rule municipalities (pop. 5,000 or greater) in Texas, U.S. to assess the commonality of the components of a municipal forestry program, municipal spending on urban forestry, and amount of assistance received from the Texas A&M Forest Service. Spending on urban forestry in Texas cities averaged USD $4.88 per capita overall. Basic tree ordinances, tree boards, non-profit tree advocacy groups, and proactive maintenance cycles were all fairly common. Urban forest management plans and tree inventories were very uncommon. About 70% of municipal forestry programs are housed in their cities’ Parks and Recreation Department, with the majority of the remainder occurring in their Public Works Department. The level of assistance received by municipalities from the Texas A&M Forest Service is consistent with the budget priorities and mission statement of that organization, which focuses on delivering technical and educational assistance over financial assistance. A lack of recent national trends to compare against greatly hampers understanding the efforts of Texas municipalities relative to other states. However, identifying current trends in Texas offers value to the Texas A&M Forest Service to understand the effect of their service delivery strategy. Urban foresters and city managers can also use these results to compare themselves against their peers, a common practice in setting municipal budgets and policy.