EARTHWATCH : The Trees of Life : Despite the drought, city dwellers are being encouraged to plant them to help clean the air.

Next Sunday, KCBS-TV (Channel 2) will broadcast a special on the famous TreePeople who have planted more than a million trees in Southern California. This 20,000-strong volunteer organization, one of a network throughout the nation, works day and night (literally, because of traffic conditions) to plant trees on city open spaces.

The Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory at UC Berkeley has calculated that one urban tree does the job of 10 forest trees in keeping greenhouse gases from the air.

Which brings us to the question: What’s a drought-afflicted citizen who is worried about water but also worried about trees supposed to do? The answer, experts say, is that residents of Ventura County should be volunteering to plant trees.

“In the last two years California has lost over 10 million trees in our forests to the drought,” said Harold R. Wait, director of the California Department of Forestry. “It is critically important that we plant urban trees.”

This winter, Wait received a lot of inquiries from civic officials wondering if plantings should be suspended for the duration of the drought. In this area, Thousand Oaks and Ventura put the brakes on planting. But now both are re-examining the issue and even developing plans to enlist volunteers. Oxnard, coming from behind in the whole business of tree replacement, just hired an urban forester and bought a lot of planting stock. The city wants citizens to call the forester and volunteer to help plant the trees.

Wait became so worried that plantings might slow down that he circulated a public appeal to officials this month. “Our cities and towns cannot afford not to plant trees. Playing catch-up later will be a difficult process.”

Where, you ask, will the water to keep them going come from? According to experts at the Los Angeles County arboretum, an urban tree can get by on 15 gallons of water a week. What that translates into is one less driveway car-washing a month.

I attended a training session for “citizen foresters” conducted for TreePeople by Deborah Green, an arborist for the city of Ventura. The training and work session was conducted in Los Angeles under TreePeople auspices (and you can see what it’s like on TV Sunday).

Many Ventura County residents are receiving top quality instruction through this training.

Schools, scout groups and service organizations from our county are trekking down to TreePeople headquarters in the Santa Monica Mountains to participate in various programs. But if you call, they will explain how you can get involved closer to home.

Our county is just now beginning to develop a TreePeople consciousness. Orange County and Los Angeles County in the south and a dozen areas in the northern part of the state have organized countywide “community forestry forums,” as they are called by Bill Elmendorf, the Thousand Oaks urban forester.

If you live in Thousand Oaks, you can bridge the gap personally by getting yourself on a newly formed city commission, the Tree Advisory Board. Call City Clerk Nancy Dillon at 497-8611 and request further information about the vacancy on the board.

* FYI

* TreePeople: citizen forestry training and planting projects for kids. For enrollment, call (818) 753-4600.

* TreePeople TV Special: KCBS-TV, March 24, 9:30 a.m., Host Steve Rambo.

* To volunteer for urban forestry projects: city of Oxnard, Bob Click, 984-4640, Ext. 2737; city of Ventura, Deborah Green, 652-4541; city of Thousand Oaks, Bill Elmendorf, 497-8611, Ext. 295.