CAMBRIDGE — Green Cambridge executive director Steven Nutter told the Northampton Urban Forestry Commission on Sept. 17 that his nonprofit’s Canopy Crew program combines paid youth internships, data-driven site selection and municipal partnerships to plant trees on private property and build a local green-jobs pipeline.

Nutter said the program trains 16- to 18-year-old participants in outreach, science, policy and planting as an eight-month paid internship. “Our goals are to increase canopy, to provide youth employment, to share career pathways to nature-based jobs, and to build social cohesion across neighborhoods,” he told commissioners.

Why it matters: Cambridge officials and the nonprofit cite heat, historical land use and inequitable tree distribution as drivers for concentrated canopy work. Canopy Crew targets private lots because, Nutter said, roughly 80% of the city’s tree canopy sits on private property and municipal plantings alone are insufficient.

How the program works: Green Cambridge and partner municipal departments map potential planting sites using assessor data and heat-vulnerability overlays; the nonprofit then mails targeted offers to homeowners. Nutter described a process of consent forms, a printed care packet for recipients, a second-year check-in and coordination with local arborists for more advanced care. “We have a property consent form. When property owner receives a tree, they sign off on it. We leave a care packet, and they kinda take it from there,” Nutter said.

Staffing and funding: Nutter said Canopy Crew began with seed support from American Rescue Plan Act funds and later moved into a mix of municipal support and grants. “For the first couple years, we were working off ARPA funds,” he said. He added the program now receives support from the Cambridge Department of Public Works and philanthropic grants and donations; the group also contracted with the Cambridge Redevelopment Authority for mitigation plantings in Kendall Square.

Program scale and outcomes: Nutter said the program’s first full seasons included cohorts that started with about 15 young workers and finished with roughly 11, and that one season produced about 90 trees planted on 56 private properties. He described a training load of roughly 184 total hours combining classroom training (52 hours), outreach (42 hours) and planting (90 hours), and said Green Cambridge pays participants the equivalent of the Cambridge living wage — about $19.70 an hour — to make the work a meaningful job experience.

Long-term aims: The Cambridge urban forest master plan, Nutter said, recommends planting roughly 2,000 trees a year over decades; Green Cambridge’s goals include expanding nursery capacity and developing local workforce pipelines to meet such targets. “We’re gonna have a nursery for about 300 trees, of our own, so we’re not shipping them in,” he said, describing plans for an on-site community nursery and partnerships with private developers that have permitted nursery space on rooftops.

Commission questions: Northampton commissioners asked about liability, watering and private-property plantings; Nutter said the nonprofit maintains typical contractor insurance, uses DigSafe where applicable and provides follow-up care guidance to owners. He also described partnerships with local contractors for pruning and more technical arborist services.

What’s next: Nutter offered to share program resources, outreach materials and the Canopy Crew care packet with Northampton staff and volunteers.

Ending: The presentation lasted about an hour and prompted interest from commissioners in adapting outreach and youth-employment elements for Northampton’s planting program.