Leading the Next Chapter: Beth Berry on the Future of Project EverGreen

Leading the Next Chapter: A Conversation with Project EverGreen Board President Beth Berry

Project EverGreen is entering an exciting new chapter, one built on more than two decades of serving military families, revitalizing community green spaces, and bringing the green industry together around a shared purpose.

As the organization continues to expand its impact, including assuming leadership of Renewal & Remembrance at Arlington National Cemetery beginning in 2027, strong leadership has never been more important.

Beth Berry, vice president of turf and ornamental at Advanced Turf Solutions and president of Project EverGreen’s Board of Directors, has been an active supporter of the organization for several years. In this conversation, she shares her vision for the future, why volunteer service continues to inspire her, and how the green industry can build on its legacy of giving back.

Q: What is your top priority as Project EverGreen Board President?

A: We are incredibly honored to have been entrusted with leading Renewal & Remembrance into the future of our industry.

My top priority is making sure this is a seamless transition for our volunteers, our sponsors, and, most importantly, the families of our nation’s heroes as we help beautify the hallowed grounds of Arlington National Cemetery. That means successfully leading Renewal & Remembrance into its next chapter beginning in 2027 while continuing to grow the mission of GreenCare for Troops.

Renewal & Remembrance - Project EverGreen

Project EverGreen Board President Beth Berry is committed to leading Renewal & Remembrance into its next chapter while honoring its proud tradition of volunteer service at Arlington National Cemetery.

To be trusted to work alongside Arlington National Cemetery’s full-time grounds crew is a responsibility we do not take lightly. Ensuring this event continues to showcase our industry’s commitment to excellence and service is essential to the long-term success and sustainability of this remarkable tradition.

Q: What makes Project EverGreen’s volunteer model unique?

A: Project EverGreen mobilizes an entire industry to action.

Our volunteers are lawn care and landscape professionals who show up with their own equipment, their own expertise, and their own time. That hands-on, boots-on-the-ground approach creates a direct connection between the people doing the work and the families and communities receiving it. It’s personal in a way that’s hard to replicate.

Every time I see or read about one of our volunteers serving a deployed military family, I’m reminded there is an opportunity cost for that business owner. That’s one more lawn they aren’t servicing, one more customer they aren’t billing. We never lose sight of that sacrifice, and we deeply appreciate the selfless spirit these companies demonstrate while serving military families.

The same is true for GreenCare for Communities. Our volunteers and donors have transformed neglected parks, athletic fields, and public green spaces into healthy, vibrant places where communities can gather, play, and thrive.

Q: Where do you see the greatest opportunity for Project EverGreen to expand its impact?

A: I’m most focused on reaching more military families through GreenCare for Troops.

We’ve been serving deployed service members and their families for more than 20 years, and the need hasn’t gone away. If anything, it’s grown. Every family we can take one responsibility off the shoulders of is a family that gains a little more peace of mind while their loved one is deployed.

One of my favorite comments we hear from deployed service members is, ‘It’s one less thing I have to worry about while I’m away from my home and family.’ That’s why, in addition to creating a healthier lawn and yard for the family, is exactly why we do this.

Q: How does Project EverGreen strengthen the green industry?

A: Every time our industry shows up for a military family or a GreenCare for Communities project, it reminds people what this industry truly represents. We are skilled professionals, generous neighbors, and dedicated community partners.

That visibility matters. It helps attract the next generation into the profession while changing perceptions about careers in the lawn and landscape industry. We’re demonstrating that this industry doesn’t just create beautiful landscapes, it makes a meaningful difference in people’s lives.

Q: Why is the Clean Air Calculator such an important tool?

A: For a long time, our industry’s impact was something people could see but not always measure.

The Clean Air Calculator changes that. It gives us real, measurable data that quantifies the environmental value of the green spaces our volunteers and partners create and maintain. In many ways, it allows our industry to go on offense by demonstrating the positive environmental benefits we deliver every day.

That matters because donors, sponsors, and communities increasingly want measurable results, not just good intentions. The Clean Air Calculator allows us to provide both.

Q: What role do volunteers, partners, and industry leaders play in Project EverGreen’s future?

A: None of this happens without our volunteers and sponsor and donor partners. They are the momentum behind everything we accomplish.

As we enter this next chapter, I’d encourage every company and every professional in our industry to ask how they can be part of it, whether that’s volunteering through GreenCare for Troops, supporting Renewal & Remembrance, participating in a GreenCare for Communities project, or simply helping spread the word.

This mission has always been bigger than any one organization.

One thing I know for certain is that the green industry fiercely supports and serves one another. Of the thousands of friends and colleagues I’ve met throughout my career, very few originally set out to build a career in lawn and landscape. Yet here we all are. This industry has a way of drawing people in, and once you’re here, it’s the people who make you stay. Your customers. Your employees. Your industry friends.

If I’m successful as Board President, Project EverGreen will dramatically expand the number of volunteers, partners, and supporters helping us maximize our impact.

Buckle up. The best is yet to come.

Get Involved with Project EverGreen

To learn more about Project EverGreen’s initiatives and how you can get involved, visit https://projectevergreen.org/

 

 

What Is Your Yard Really Doing for the Air?

What is your yard really doing for the air? Project EverGreen’s Clean Air Calculator helps answer that question by showing how your lawn, trees, and landscape contribute to cleaner air. Once you’ve entered your yard’s details and received the results, the next step is understanding what those numbers mean for your family, neighborhood, and community.

The Clean Air Calculator was designed to translate the environmental benefits of healthy lawns, trees, and landscapes into something homeowners can understand and act on. It measures how your yard contributes to yard air quality, carbon sequestration in lawns, and cleaner, healthier air for people in your community.

This guide walks you through how to read your score, what each metric represents, and how small changes to your yard can make a measurable difference.

Why Your Yard Matters More Than You Think

Healthy green spaces don’t just look good. They work hard behind the scenes. Lawns, trees, and shrubs act as natural air filters, capturing carbon dioxide, producing oxygen, cooling neighborhoods, and reducing airborne pollutants.

The Clean Air Calculator helps put real numbers behind the environmental benefits of healthy yards, showing how everyday residential landscapes contribute to cleaner air at a local level.

Decoding the Key Results

  1. Carbon Sequestered: What Your Yard Stores

What it means: Carbon sequestration refers to how much carbon dioxide your lawn and landscape plants pull from the air and store in soil and plant material.

How to think about it: Your calculator result may be compared to:

  • Miles driven in a car
  • Gallons of gasoline burned
  • Hours of home energy use

For example, if your yard sequesters the equivalent of hundreds of miles of driving, it means your landscape is actively offsetting emissions created by everyday activities.

Why it matters: Even modest-sized lawns and landscapes play a role in reducing atmospheric carbon, especially when multiplied across entire neighborhoods.

  1. Clean Air Produced: Oxygen and Pollutant Reduction

What it means: Plants naturally produce oxygen while also capturing pollutants such as particulate matter and ozone.

How to think about it: The calculator often expresses this in relatable terms, such as hours of air conditioning offset and equivalent clean air for a certain number of people.

This helps connect abstract measurements to real-world comfort and health.

Why it matters: Cleaner air contributes to healthier lungs, improved outdoor comfort, and reduced heat stress, especially in urban and suburban communities.

  1. People Benefitted: Your Yard’s Ripple Effect

What it means: This estimate shows how many people could benefit from the clean air your yard helps produce over time.

How to think about it: It’s not just about your household. Air moves, circulates, and benefits neighbors, passersby, and your broader community.

Why it matters: Collectively, residential landscapes create a meaningful environmental impact when millions of homeowners maintain healthy yards.

How Different Yards Score: Three Sample Profiles

A Typical Suburban Lot

  • Moderate turf coverage
  • A few mature trees
  • Some foundation plantings

What the score shows: Balanced benefits across carbon storage and air quality, with solid performance and room for improvement through added trees or healthier turf.

A Heavily Treed Yard

  • Large canopy trees
  • Layered shrubs and groundcover
  • Healthy soil

What the score shows: Higher carbon sequestration and stronger air-cleaning benefits, highlighting the significant role trees play in improving yard air quality.

A Minimally Landscaped Yard

  • Limited turf
  • Few or no trees
  • Sparse plantings

What the score shows – Lower overall impact, but also the greatest opportunity. Adding even one tree or expanding turf can significantly improve results.

Where Your Yard Is Doing Well and Where It Can Do More

Your Clean Air Calculator score isn’t a grade. It’s a snapshot.

It helps identify strengths you’re already building on and small, achievable changes that can deliver big gains. Simple improvements can include:

  • Planting an additional tree
  • Expanding turf in underutilized areas
  • Improving lawn health through proper mowing, watering, and soil care
  • Adding shrubs or native plants that support long-term growth

Each change compounds over time, improving both carbon sequestration in lawns and overall air quality benefits.

The Bigger Picture: Why This Tool Exists

The Clean Air Calculator reinforces a simple truth: yards matter.

When homeowners understand the environmental value of their landscapes, they’re more likely to protect and improve them, benefiting communities, neighborhoods, and future generations.

Your yard is already doing important work for the air. The calculator helps you see it, understand it, and make it even better.

Try the Clean Air Calculator and explore how your yard contributes to cleaner, healthier air and what it could do next.

 

Tyler Adams Soccer Pitch Opens in Wappinger Falls Following Community Field Restoration

The newly restored Tyler Adams Soccer Pitch at Martz Field is once again ready to serve young athletes and families in Wappinger Falls, New York.

On July 22, Project EverGreen joined Scotts®, U.S. Men’s National Soccer Team standout Tyler Adams, Every Kid Sports, the Town of Wappinger Falls and green industry partners to celebrate the completion of the community athletic field renovation. The project transformed a worn natural grass playing surface into a safe, healthy field where the next generation of athletes can play, learn and grow.

Supported through Scotts’ Keep It Real initiative, the renovation is the latest GreenCare for Communities project led by Project EverGreen. It demonstrates how collaboration across the green industry can create lasting benefits for local communities by investing in healthy green spaces.

A Homecoming for Tyler Adams

For Adams, the ribbon-cutting was more than the opening of a renovated soccer field. It was a return to the place where his own soccer journey began.

“Growing up in Wappinger, this field played an important role in shaping who I am, both as an athlete and as a person,” said Adams. “It’s meaningful to return home and see it ready for the next generation of players. Every kid deserves access to safe places to play, and I’m proud to help bring that opportunity to my hometown community.”

Following the ceremony, Adams met with local youth and families, celebrating a project that reflects his commitment to giving back to the community that helped launch his career.

Green Industry Partners Make the Project Possible

Project EverGreen coordinated the restoration alongside Scotts, Every Kid Sports, the Town of Wappinger Falls and numerous green industry partners that donated products, equipment, expertise and volunteer labor.

Contributing partners included:

Together, these organizations restored the natural grass field while demonstrating the environmental, recreational and community benefits of professionally managed landscapes.

“Projects like this demonstrate what’s possible when the green industry comes together around a common purpose,” said Cindy Code, executive director of Project EverGreen. “From manufacturers and suppliers to contractors and volunteers, every partner played an important role in creating a field that will benefit local athletes and families for years to come. We’re grateful to Scotts, Tyler Adams, Every Kid Sports and everyone who helped make this transformation possible.”

Investing in Youth Sports Through Keep It Real

The Tyler Adams Soccer Pitch project is part of Scotts’ Keep It Real initiative, which helps improve access to high-quality natural grass playing fields so more children can experience the benefits of youth sports and outdoor play.

The initiative partners with organizations like Project EverGreen and Every Kid Sports to create healthier places where children can develop confidence, teamwork and lifelong memories.

“This project represents what Keep It Real is all about – investing in the places where kids can learn, grow and build confidence through playing sports,” said John Sass, senior vice president and general manager of North America at ScottsMiracle-Gro. “Seeing Tyler return home and celebrate a transformation alongside the Wappinger community makes this renovation really special.”

Continuing to Restore Community Green Spaces

The Tyler Adams Soccer Pitch follows another GreenCare for Communities renovation completed in June at the Yawkey Boys & Girls Club of Roxbury in Boston, where Project EverGreen, Scotts and industry partners restored a heavily used natural grass baseball field.

Through GreenCare for Communities, Project EverGreen continues to partner with companies throughout the green industry to restore parks, athletic fields and other public green spaces. Each project helps create healthier neighborhoods while showcasing the lasting value of professionally maintained landscapes.

 

Renewal & Remembrance to Be Led by Project EverGreen Beginning in 2027

Renewal & Remembrance, one of the green industry’s longest-running volunteer service traditions, will begin an exciting new chapter in 2027 as Project EverGreen assumes leadership of the annual initiative at Arlington National Cemetery.

Following the 2026 event, stewardship of Renewal & Remembrance will transition from the National Association of Landscape Professionals (NALP) to Project EverGreen, ensuring the annual day of service continues to honor America’s veterans while engaging lawn and landscape professionals from across the country.

For nearly 30 years, Renewal & Remembrance has united volunteers who generously donate their time, equipment, and expertise to enhance the grounds of Arlington National Cemetery, preserving one of the nation’s most sacred landscapes while paying tribute to the men and women who served.

Renewal & Remembrance - Project EverGreen

Landscape professionals donate their time, talent, and expertise during Renewal & Remembrance, helping preserve the beauty and dignity of Arlington National Cemetery.

“Renewal & Remembrance has always represented the very best of the landscape industry,” said Britt Wood, CEO of NALP. “As NALP looks to the future, we believe Project EverGreen is uniquely positioned to carry this tradition forward. Their history of organizing meaningful community service projects and their commitment to military families, veterans and healthy green spaces make them the ideal organization to lead Renewal & Remembrance into the future.”

Founded by lawn and landscape industry leaders more than two decades ago, Project EverGreen has built a national reputation for mobilizing volunteers, donors, and community partners to restore and maintain healthy green spaces. Through signature initiatives such as GreenCare for Troops and GreenCare for Communities, the nonprofit has developed a proven model for coordinating volunteer projects that serve military families, veterans, and communities nationwide.

“We are honored to be entrusted with the future of Renewal & Remembrance,” said Cindy Code, executive director of Project EverGreen. “This event has a powerful legacy, and we understand the responsibility that comes with caring for sacred ground and honoring those who served our country. Project EverGreen was created to bring the green industry together in service, and we look forward to working with Arlington National Cemetery, volunteers and supporters to preserve this event while building on its impact for years to come.”

To ensure a seamless transition, NALP will continue to champion Renewal & Remembrance while working alongside Project EverGreen to maintain continuity for volunteers, sponsors, and industry partners.

“From the very beginning, Renewal & Remembrance has been bigger than any one organization,” Wood added. “We are proud of what NALP and our members have built, and we are confident that Project EverGreen will build on that legacy.”

This year’s Renewal & Remembrance will take place July 20, 2026, when hundreds of landscape and lawn care professionals will once again gather at Arlington National Cemetery to continue the event’s longstanding mission of caring for one of America’s most treasured green spaces. The event is made possible through the generous support of industry partners, including title sponsor Stanley Black & Decker, along with NALP Elite Partners Aspire Software, Caterpillar, and STIHL.

Additional support is provided by Gold Partners Carter Machinery, John Deere, SiteOne Landscape Supply, and Visterra Landscape Group, as well as Silver Partners Envu, Exmark/Toro, Heritage Landscape Supply Group, Hunter Industries, Proven Winners, RealGreen by WorkWave, and Vermeer.

As Project EverGreen prepares to guide Renewal & Remembrance into its next chapter, the organization’s commitment remains unchanged: bringing the green industry together in service to honor our nation’s heroes while preserving one of America’s most meaningful landscapes for generations to come.