President's Message April 2015

Exceptional pili nut tree on Hawaii Island.

You are going to learn a lot about us in this issue of our GreenLeaf!

Our tree preservation efforts and planting projects have kept the branches busy, and the advocating for open space protection, clean and green parks and public spaces, and signs concerns have kept our office busy. It continues to amaze me how our Executive Director Marti Townsend orchestrates the many functions that create the strong canopy of The Outdoor Circle, state-wide!

We share a collective mahalo to Noelani Sugata for her decade of service to our office. We welcome in our new office staffer Renee Nakagawa. We also bid a fond aloha to Gloria Taaffe, our tree mapping intern who will be leaving next month to finish her schooling from Florida. We are especially pleased that intern Myles Ritchie is going to stay on as Project Intern to help us finish our statewide tree mapping project. We are learning so much about the importance of the Exceptional Trees all throughout our beautiful islands.

We are looking forward to honoring Beatrice Krauss, Hawai'i's most beloved ethnobotanist, this Earth Day, April 22. Her legacy of ethnobotanical knowledge and public service lives on through her publications, course materials, plant collections and gardens, like the one at Lyon Arboretum. Bea enriched the lives of thousands of students, colleagues, friends and community groups by her teaching and spirit of aloha.

This is another in our series of micro-fundraiser Garden Tours. If you have a garden or know of one that can be the site for a Micro-fundraiser Garden tour, please let me know. It is a great way to discover more about the flora of O'ahu, meet new friends, and help support our efforts at keeping Hawai'i clean, green, and beautiful. Each tour is different but they are under 30 people, and sell out right away. Would you like to help us with a special Garden Tour in your neighborhood? We would love to hear from you!

I am so grateful to have such a hard working Board of Directors, who volunteer their expertise to best serve our nine Branches and the mission that has guided TOC for over one hundred years. I hope you will join us, reaffirm your membership, and consider volunteering through one of our Branches.


Mahalo,
Alexandra Avery
TOC President

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