LETTER: The forest through the trees
Trees are dying all over the valley due to the turf removal under mature trees required by Assembly Bill 356. More than 200 huge ash trees have died within 0.4 miles outside my neighborhood alone within a year’s time after the turf was removed and dozens more are dead and dying in my neighborhood right now.
During the Sept. 16 Clark County Commission meeting, John Entsminger, general manager of the Southern Nevada Water Authority, argued that every dead and dying tree in the valley is not a result of water conservation and that a significant portion are the result of climate change. I’m sorry, but blaming climate change for the thousands of trees all over the valley that just happened to die in the last 18 months when the turf under them was forcibly removed is ludicrous.
Lawmakers and water officials have made water unaffordable and the means to keep our legacy trees, the turf that supports their feeder roots, illegal. California just passed legislation similar to Nevada’s AB356, but with an exception for turf grass under trees. Why did they do that if turf under trees doesn’t matter? Of course it does.
All the talking points in the world will not change what we, the residents of Las Vegas, see with our own eyes every day. It’s like the old fable, “The Emperor’s New Clothes.” It doesn’t matter how many people you employ to say differently, the king is naked, and a child can see it. An awful tragedy has been perpetrated on the residents of the Las Vegas Valley.