04/17/2026
These are political times in our public service workspace when years of environmental justice, climate, and DEI-centered work are being undermined.
Over the past year, all our funding tied to equity, climate, and environmental justice was stripped away as part of a broader unraveling affecting communities and organizations committed to equity-driven public health.
And yet here we are. With deep gratitude, we can resume our tree equity work, this time in Weld and Adams counties, in partnership with our sister organization CREA Results and with renewed support from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.
We're excited to start work in Dacono, Colorado, where oil and gas development, elevated ozone levels, and cumulative exposure shape daily life, making tree equity efforts even more meaningful.
We are deeply grateful to Dacono community leader and with Américas por la Conservación, la Salud + las Artes since 2016 Lupita Cardoza, for her valiant activism. We are equally grateful to Thunder Valley K-8 School for opening its doors to our outreach and the possibility of a Miyawaki school forest, as well as to the families who joined us at the school this past Tuesday to listen and to imagine all the healing that is possible. We are also grateful to the Carbon Valley Rotary Club for their willingness to help scale this work and bring more trees into the community. Below, we share our address with Thunder K-8.
A LETTER TO DACONO
I come before you as a mother and fellow community member with a story about the healing power of trees and the privilege the organization I represent has in bringing trees to your schools, parks, and neighborhoods, thanks to the support of the Colorado Department of Public Health and the Environment.
But bear with me because this story starts badly, but it ends well, and with a promise to begin restoring what has been broken.
Let us begin with breath. Before we are parents, workers, voters, we are bodies that breathe, and yet, across communities like Dacono, across Denver, and across Puerto Rico, where I come from, we are breathing air we did not choose and that dangerously threatens our health.
Let me tell you what this means as someone who has had to learn this language to protect the family and the community I love.
There are things in our air we cannot see. One of them is called ground-level ozone. This is not the good ozone that lives high in the sky, protecting us from the sun. This is a different kind. This ozone is created right here at ground level, where we stand and hug, play, and sleep. How is that? When pollution from cars, trucks, and oil and gas operations mixes with sunlight, especially on hot days, it makes the air we breathe react in such a way that it gets ”cooked”, creating highly reactive gas. When we breathe this air, it inflames the lining of our lungs, reducing our lung function, and over time, increasing the risk of asthma and multiple respiratory diseases.
And in places like Dacono, where 300-plus oil and gas wells and energy development and rapid growth sit side by side with homes and schools, this reaction happens continuously. This is why, year after year, Carbon Valley has struggled with some of the highest levels of ground-level ozone pollution in the nation.
Now let me make this real. The federal standard for ozone, the level considered “acceptable,” though many scientists say even that is not truly safe, is 70 parts per billion.
But in Dacono, monitoring has shown, especially in summer, where levels exceed that threshold, dozens of days a year above 85 parts per billion. This means our children are breathing air while running, playing, growing, which is known to inflame their lungs, to induce chest tightness and coughing, increasing the risk of long-term respiratory disease.
Let’s remember that children are more vulnerable than we are. They breathe faster. They take in more air relative to their body size. Their lungs are still developing. So the same sickening air affects them considerably more.
Another thing in the air we cannot see is benzene. Benzene is released from oil and gas operations, fuel, and industrial processes. It is known to be an aggressive carcinogen and leukemia inducer. But you will never see it floating in the air. You will never smell it and say, " Ah, that is benzene."
Let’s pause here. Though so far this story can fill us with fear, it is truly more about the truth. We know that once we can name what is happening, we can begin to change it. And here is where the story turns around towards hope.
Before there were monitors measuring parts per billion and before there were reports and industries’ violations of air quality laws, there were systems already in place on this earth designed to help us breathe. These are, believe it or not, trees. Trees are one of the oldest technologies for survival we have. They are life-saving infrastructure that serve as public health systems.
Imagine: A single mature tree can capture over 50 pounds of carbon dioxide each year. It can remove pollutants from the air, particles, gases, the very things that make it harder for us to breathe. A tree can cool the air around it by several degrees, reducing the heat that makes the dangerous ground level ozone worse. It can reduce stress significantly and make a place feel livable again.
Just picture a street where there are no trees. Now imagine that same street with a canopy overhead. Tree equity measures have shown clearly that one block with trees can feel up to 20 degrees cooler on a 100 F day than a neighboring block with no trees. That temperature difference can be a matter of an urgent care visit or even a life-and-death matter for a fragile grandmother, a child with asthma, or a pregnant woman with compromised health.
Now consider what our collaborative work could mean at Thunder Valley K-8 School if we succeed in planting a Miyawaki forest of more than 100 trees. Once established, a forest of that size could pull 5,000 plus pounds of carbon dioxide out of the air every year, the equivalent of more than two tons annually, while also removing over 80 pounds of harmful air pollutants, including ozone, nitrogen dioxide, particulate matter, sulfur dioxide, and carbon monoxide. Add to this the fact that tall, dense vegetation barriers can reduce air pollution downwind by about 30%, and you have a compact, thickly planted school forest that can function like a living filter between students and the polluted air moving through the neighborhood. If planted densely enough, vegetation buffers can reduce noise by several decibels as well, softening the daily stress of traffic and industrial surroundings while cooling the grounds by over 15 degrees, helping reduce the heat that worsens the sickening ground-level ozone. This forest would be a protective sanctuary rooted in the ground, quietly filtering the air, cooling the campus, absorbing the pollution burden, and standing every day with students and staff as a shield for breath, learning, and well-being.
The truth is: We may not have chosen the air we are breathing today, but we can choose what we begin to build tomorrow together so that one day soon enough our children may stand under the shade of a tree that this community planted and take a deep breath that will be cleaner, safer, and fuller.
That is the work of our Tree Keepers / Promotores Verdes | Nature Health Workers initiative we bring to you today: cultivating in our communities the care of trees as a source of health, protecting the tree neighborhood canopy as life-giving infrastructure, and strengthening the relationship between nature, well-being, and justice.
Yes, our hands are not tied. We can decide how we respond. We can plant. We can protect. We can organize. We can become keepers of trees and of each other.
IRENE VILAR
AFC+A FOUNDER
Suse Laguna Irene Vilar Lupita Cardoza
