Introduction
Bob Skiera was an urban forestry pioneer, known for his ability to communicate the needs and benefits of the urban forest and helped build bridges of trust and cooperation between urban foresters and other urban planning and management professionals. He was a past President of both the International Society of Arboriculture and the Wisconsin Arborist Association, served memorably as a Milwaukee City Forester and is a member of the Wisconsin Forestry Hall of Fame.
John White was an arborist and urban forest influencer in Florida. He loved trees and the community that was connecting with trees. He knew how to build up the relationships of the tree community to those who had great impacts on those trees.
Established jointly by TREE Fund, the Skiera Family, Wisconsin Arborist Association and the International Society of Arboriculture, The Bob Skiera Memorial Fund now provides financial support for the “Building Bridges Initiative”. The Initiative is intended to help arborists and urban foresters communicate the value of trees and urban forests through engagement via collaborative research and other projects with public works officials, risk assessment professionals, civil engineers, wildlife researchers, soil scientists and others. The maximum award value of grants under the Building Bridges Initiative is $30,000, with $25,000 provided annually by the Bob Skiera Memorial Fund and $5,000 provided annually by the John White Memorial Fund.
Note: The 2026 Building Bridges Initiative Grant(s) will be focused on research to facilitate or engage interactions between urban forest managers, arborists, and other professionals committed to maximizing value/use of the urban forest resource. Suggested areas of investigation (this list is not all-inclusive) might include:
- Quantitative and/or qualitative analysis of urban forest benefits to humans and communities;
- Policy formation and program implementation;
- “Nature Based Solutions”;
- Ecosystem services;
- Etc.
TREE Fund welcomes research proposals and applications from a wide range of academic and technical disciplines, of both a qualitative and a quantitative nature. TREE Fund does not fund the following types of projects, and will not accept applications for such work:
- Grants to individuals;
- Projects that are primarily municipal tree surveys or assessments;
- Tree planting programs;
- Studies focused on traditional forestry and timber production, agroforestry, and ecology and conservation of forested and other natural areas,
- Product testing primarily for the benefit of the company that manufactures the product.
APPLICATION PROCESS
Grant Cycle Open: August 1, 2026
Last Day to Request Letter of Intent: September 15, 2026
Grant Application Due: October 1, 2026
Announcement of Grant Recipient: Late December, 2026
TREE Fund will accept completed applications only between August 1 and October 1, 2026. To apply, fill out an application on our online portal – by clicking here.
Letters of Intent (LOI) need to be completed before September 15, 2026. Your LOI must clearly identify the Principal Investigator and Institution who will be contracted for the work should your application be approved.
TREE Fund will evaluate whether your LOI concept meets all of our application criteria and is deemed to have a reasonable possibility of success given the year’s research priorities. If and only if your LOI is approved, TREE Fund will send you a notification and open the application to you. TREE Fund determinations on whether an LOI meets the application criteria are final and not negotiable.
An instructional video on our Grants is available on our YouTube Page.
PROJECT REQUIREMENTS
Application Requirements can be found here.
REPORTING REQUIREMENTS
It is TREE Fund’s explicit desire that research findings eventually be freely and widely available to any and all parties who may benefit from the author’s work. At the same time, TREE Fund recognizes the importance of academic and professional journal publications and will work with grant recipients to ensure that findings are disseminated in a manner that is cognizant of all parties’ schedules and needs. Recipients should inform TREE Fund when funded research findings are published or presented at conferences so that these accomplishments can be widely publicized. Recipients should also recognize the support provided by TREE Fund in their articles or presentations related to the funded project. Recipients are strongly encouraged to publish findings to relevant professional journals, i.e. Arboriculture and Urban Forestry, Urban Forestry & Urban Greening, Arboricultural Journal, Trees: Structure and Function, Journal of Horticultural Science and Biotechnology, Plant Pathology, Hortscience, Horticultural Science, Sustainable Development, Landscape and Urban Planning, Journal of Urban Health, Environment and Urbanization, Urban Ecosystems, etc.
