Hello Dear MJ Family of L.O.V.E! I have a VERY IMPORTANT MESSAGE from American Forests that I need to share with you. Evidently someone called American Forests to find out more about this project and was a little confused because of the discrepancy between what I was saying and what American Forests was saying so American Forests wrote the following message to clear everything up. You all know my vision for this project, of ultimately having “Michael Jackson Memorial Forests” in many countries, on every continent in the world, and you know that the first forest is supposed to be planted in California in Spring of 2011. You also know that to be able to OFFICIALLY do this, we need permission from the Jackson Estate, which I was hoping to get from Joe and Katherine. They now know about this project and are in the midst of checking it out…it is my fervent hope and prayer that they will not only give us their blessing but will issue a statement about this project, letting all MJ fans know about it so fans and celebrities the world over can be a part of it, too, and plant MILLIONS of trees for Michael. That’s what needs to happen to give wings to this project so it will take flight and come to fruition as we all envision it to be.
I started “A Million Trees For Michael” to answer MJ’s plea to take care of the planet, and we are definitely doing that with this project. This is what American Forests and I have worked out: until we get the official permission to use MJ’s name, your donations will be used to plant trees where they are most needed in American Forest’s Global Releaf Program. You will still get your certificates saying you planted trees in Michael’s honor or memory. However, and this is VERY IMPORTANT, once we get the necessary permission from the Jackson Family and/or Estate, American Forests WILL CREDIT BACK ALL OF THAT MONEY to the “Michael Jackson Memorial Forest”, to be used to plant trees for Michael’s forest. I have already contacted corporations about donating land for the forest and some are open to this but not until we get that official permission from the Estate. That’s why it is SO critical to get this permission, in order to move forward.
In the meantime, we are all fulfilling Michael’s wish of healing the planet and that’s what is important right now, don’t you agree? So please do not lose heart, Dear Family! This is actually a good development because it means even MORE trees will be planted for our Beautiful Mother Earth.
Here is American’s Forests official statement:
“Working with Trisha Franklin, creator of www.amilliontreesformichael.com, American Forests is accepting donations to plant trees through our Global ReLeaf™
program. Donors are welcome to plant their trees through Global ReLeaf and to request certificates stating that the trees will be planted in memory of
Michael. Currently all donations using the MJ code will be used to fund tree planting where it is needed most – please note that your trees may not be allocated to one specific forest, but may be planted in multiple forests as required.
We do not currently have a specific forest ecosystem set aside as a memorial forest for Michael, although we are working on it.
There are two obstacles to this that need to be overcome before a specific forest can be grounded in Michael’s name.
1 – We need formal written legal approval from the executor of Michael Jackson’s estate in order to use his name. Even though American Forests is a non-profit, any unauthorized use of Michael’s name to raise funds may be open to litigation
2 – We need funding to procure a location for a memorial forest. Depending on the size of the land and the trees to be planted, we would need committed funding in the range of $10,000 -$15,000 to even begin exploring the possibility. To this end, Trisha is seeking to reach out to potential corporate sponsors; this is ongoing with no definitive end date
When, and if, American Forests receives approval to use MJ’s name and the funds required to establish a formal forest ecosystem for Michael, it is our intention TO CREDIT ALL DONATIONS ALREADY RECEIVED TO DATE (using the MJ code) TO THE NEW MJ FOREST. This means that if the new forest, for
example, would plant 50,000 trees and we have already received donations (using the MJ code) for 5,000, we would then credit 5,000 trees from the previous donors to the new forest – effectively meaning that 5,000 have already been sponsored and only 45,000 remain for sponsorship.
Wouldn’t it be great to be able to visit a forest here in the U.S., see MJ’s name on the sign, and know that somewhere amongst all those trees are those that you helped plant? We would love to see it happen and hopefully, one day soon, it will.”
So now you can see why it’s very important to continue in our prayers to get permission from the Jackson family to use Michael’s name. Love and blessings to you all, Dear Family. Trisha
