Las Vegas council adopts Urban Forestry Management Plan aiming for 60,000 trees over 25 years

The Las Vegas City Council on Dec. 17 adopted an Urban Forestry Management Plan designed to mitigate urban heat, increase canopy and guide future planting and maintenance. City staff presented a 2024 inventory created with a “smart tree” scan (street imagery/LiDAR) that mapped municipal trees and produced a digital inventory of roughly 40,000 city-managed trees.

Brad Dossler, the city’s urban forester, said the scan and inventory showed canopy coverage in the city is in the single digits (about 6%), with an estimated roughly 17% canopy decrease in recent years. The plan sets a goal of planting 60,000 trees over the next 25 years, prioritizes diverse, drought-tolerant and native species, and calls for a mix of public-planting programs, a preferred-species list and code updates to support long-term canopy health.

Dossler explained the inventory approach and the decision to scan periodically so the city can track species performance and survival over time; staff said the technique reduces the cost of repeated inventories and improves data-driven decisions about which species thrive locally. The plan also includes a city nursery program to support species diversity and resilience and a free-tree pilot for targeted ZIP codes.

Council members praised the data-driven approach and asked staff to emphasize neighborhood outreach and guidance for private property owners who manage mature or diseased trees. Staff said follow-up work will include code amendments, grant-seeking and continued public engagement and that they will report back with implementation steps.

The council voted to adopt the plan and related implementation measures. The plan will guide city planting priorities and link to development-review conditions in future planning cases.