TD Bank Wants to Prove it’s as Green as its Logo; Will Plant 50 Trees on East Boston Greenway

With the Take Back Boston campaign recently organizing hundreds of demonstrators to descend on Bank of America, TD Bank is setting out to prove that not all big banks are the bad guys.

On October 12^th, employee volunteers from TD Bank, TD Auto Finance, TD Insurance and TD Ameritrade will plant 50 trees at the Grove Street entrance of the East Boston Greenway; an area of Boston that is particularly void of urban tree cover. Volunteers from local organizations, including Friends of the Boston Greenway, Greenway Gardeners, Boston Natural Areas Network, East Boston YMCA and Meridian House, will also be on-scene to help.

The East Boston tree-planting is part of TD Bank’s larger “TD Tree Days” program. In the month of October, TD Bank – working in conjunction with Alliance for Community Trees – will plant a total of 200 trees in select locations around the country. When fully grown, the 200 trees are expected to absorb a combined total of about 18 tons of pollution each year.

“We’re glad that banks like TD Bank are concerned with environmental issues and we applaud and support the work of local groups planting trees,” Khalida Smalls told New England Post. Smalls is the Organizing Director of Alternatives for Community & Environment (ACE), a Roxbury-based non-profit organization that works toward achieving environmental justice for lower income communities. “Every step we take towards a greener future is a good thing, and as an environmental justice organization, we define the environment as the places where we live, work and play.”

Despite praising TD Bank’s tree-planting program, Smalls was quick to point out that in the scheme of things, banks are doing more harm to local communities than good.

“While planting 200 trees in the US (which averages four in each state) is nice, millions of families have been evicted by banks in the US,” said Smalls. “There was a record 2.9 million foreclosure filings in the US in 2010—in Massachusetts, the rate spiked 32 percent from the year before. It was just reported that 937 Massachusetts homes were foreclosed on in August 2011, the largest number yet for any month this year.”

Smalls’ point is that banks like TD and Bank of America should care not only about the natural environment, but also “about families and the lower-income communities and communities of color their policies are decimating.”

“Without corporate accountability and an overhaul of predatory bank practices, our communities will continue to struggle, no matter how many trees are planted.”

Related posts:

1. Bank of America to Cut 3,500 Jobs
2. Big Rigs Going Green: Massport Establishes “Clean Truck Program” to Reduce Emissions
3. Boston Tourism Industry is Seeing Green; Big Spike after Two Lackluster Years
4. Bank of America Will Cut 30,000 Jobs
5. Bank of America Shares Soar After Buffett Invests $5 Billion

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Posted by erik devaney on Oct 5 2011. Filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry