Canopy: Trees for Palo Alto is proud to announce a partnership with Roche Pharmaceuticals to improve the quality of Palo Alto's urban forest. Roche will be giving Canopy a $15,000 grant spread over the next three years.

Vice President of Communications and Public Affairs for Roche Pharmaceuticals Nancy Peterson, stated: "A partnership with Canopy is terrific for Roche since one of our key community priorities is to contribute to a healthy local environment. This is a great fit for us since our financial investment can be coupled with volunteer opportunities for our employees."

Not only will Roche employees be encouraged to volunteer at Canopy's Community events, but Roche has also generously offered to provide meeting facilities for upcoming Canopy events.

The first project involving the Roche volunteers was a planting of trees at Jordan Middle School in Palo Alto. Twenty-four Roche employees joined with four regular Canopy volunteers to plant 16 trees in the parking lot and along the edge of the buildings. The project was timed to coincide with Earth Week celebrations. For each employee involved with the planting at Jordan, Roche made an additional contribution of $50 per employee, or $1200, to Canopy.

On June 9 , Canopy will invite the community to a "Tree Walk" on the 100+ acre Roche campus, which is one of the most beautiful business locations on the peninsula. Nestled among 1,800 trees in the Stanford Research Park, the Roche site is a unique example of an urban forest. The walk will be led by City of Palo Alto's Planning Arborist, Dave Dockter, and will be open to the general public.

There will be more joint tree plantings, Tree Walks on the Roche Campus, and other events in the future. The details will be published, as they become finalized.

The $15,000 grant is the largest private grant in Canopy's history and is an excellent example of private businesses, the public and Canopy coming together to improve the urban forest.

Roche has 1,200 employees in Palo Alto who work on discovering and developing new medicines to treat diseases including arthritis, asthma and other respiratory diseases, osteoporosis, urological disorders, and neuropsychiatric disorders such as depression and schizophrenia. Roche is one of the leading healthcare companies in the world, with headquarters in Switzerland.

Sponsored by the Peninsula Conservation Center, Canopy is a non-profit organization whose goal is to rejuvenate Palo Alto's urban forest by involving residents, community groups and the City of Palo Alto in planting trees and inspiring people to care for them.

In addition to planting trees, Canopy provides educational and referral service and has a library on tree care. Volunteers are also needed for a survey of heritage oaks, as neighborhood "tree ambassadors" and to work on other educational programs.

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