Hantz Woodlands facts for kids

Hantz Woodlands, also known as Hantz Farms, is an urban tree farm on the lower east side of Detroit. The project has cleared more than 2,000 vacant city-owned lots, totaling more than 140 acres, and has demolished blighted homes and cleared empty lots to make way for a hardwood tree farm, bounded by E. Jefferson Avenue, Mack Avenue, St. Jean Street and Van Dyke Avenue. Hantz Woodlands is a project of Hantz Farms, LLC, a division of Hantz Group. It is the largest urban tree farm in the U.S.

Background

John Hantz, twenty-year Detroit native and CEO of Hantz Group, proposed Hantz Woodlands as a way to remedy blight, increase neighborhood safety, and stop the decline of Detroit property values. Blighted areas can have negative psychological impacts on community members and lead to higher crime rates.  Removing blight can help improve how outsiders and community members view the community and increase their desire to invest in the area.

During his daily drives through Detroit, Hantz noticed the countless empty lots and decaying houses, many of which were in foreclosure and/or were in city ownership, that he passed on his route.  Many of the lots in the areas that would later become part of Hantz Woodlands are on blocks that have been characterized by Data Driven Detroit as blocks that are “least active, with less density, more abandonment, and a high concentration of vacant lots” or areas with high numbers of vacant lots and lower occupancy levels mixed with “quality housing stock." John Hantz was inspired to improve these areas and decrease the perception that vacant land detracts from the value of an area in order to improve neighborhood morale, safety, and value as well as improve the overall image that comes to mind when people think of Detroit.

Approximately 40 square miles of Detroit’s 139 square mile area were vacant before Hantz began his project. Hantz stated that this lack of scarcity in real estate and available properties caused a continual decline of Detroit’s property values, and he suggested that making a large amount of this vacant land unavailable in the real estate market could raise property values. He also believed that buying up this land and creating an urban farm would create a platform for tourism, education, community development, and economic development while returning a portion of the city’s 40 square vacant miles to the city tax roll. “I thought, What could do that in a positive way? What’s a development that people would want to be associated with? And that’s when I came up with a farm,” Hantz says.

Hantz originally envisioned Hantz Woodlands as a horticultural farm because he believed it could help generate economic activity as well as remedy the lack of healthy food options, known as a food desert, which many residents in Detroit currently face. However, concerns over competition with local urban farmers, worries about the use of pesticides, neighborhood distrust of Hantz’s motives, and Hantz's grievances with agricultural taxes led to the conversion of the project into a large-scale tree farm.

Planting projects

The project's 2013 agreement with the city of Detroit called for the demolition of 50 vacant city-owned structures, the planting of 15,000 trees, and the general maintenance and upkeep of the district properties. In December 2014, Detroit mayor Mike Duggan presented the company with a certificate of completion for having fulfilled this agreement.

In addition to hosting annual tree-planting events, Hantz Woodlands began the Timber Trot 5K in 2016 to benefit the Hantz Foundation.

• On May 17, 2014, over 1,000 volunteers planted 15,000 maple and oak saplings on 20 acres at Hantz Woodlands.
• On October 15, 2014, 150 mature sugar maple trees were driven to Detroit from Michigan and New York, and planted at Hantz Woodlands. Keith Alexander, an Oxford-based tree broker, located sugar maples that were straight enough and tall enough to meet Hantz's specifications.
• On May 9, 2015, volunteers planted 5,000 tulip poplar trees, with the intent to later transport some to a different location.
• On May 7, 2016, Hantz Woodlands planted 3,150 six-foot-tall sugar maples.
• On May 6, 2017, volunteers planted approximately 3,000 trees. See images of tree planting 2017