Last week I wrote an opinion piece complaining about the cherry blossoms being taken out of the campus mall. This week I would like to apologize for casting landscape maintenance in a negative light.

There is an article in this issue explaining that the reason the cherry blossoms were taken out was due to the trees being sick with sunscald, not because maintenance or the school just wanted them gone.

As a journalist and chief copy editor of The Easterner, it is my duty to get down to the truth and base my reporting off that.

With my last piece, I made an assumption and my reporting on the assumption was not done well. While I did attempt to contact landscape maintenance, it was not right for me to rant and rave about something I knew little about at the time. I noticed the trees were gone and assumed Eastern did it for no reason.

I now understand why the trees were taken out and I am in full support of the decision. While they were beautiful and brought life to the campus mall, there is no point in having sick trees in such a lively part of Eastern.

With that said, I do hope something will take the place of the trees. The mall seems empty and lifeless without them. It would be awesome to see either new trees or possibly a fountain or some kind of sculpture in the middle of the mall with seating around it. Students could bask in the sun and read a good book or meet friends for a quick chat before their classes start.

I stand by my argument that there are other issues that need to be fixed around campus — both of the car barriers outside Patterson Hall are out of the ground now. It would be interesting to know what our guests from around the country during NCUR thought of our campus.

As mentioned in my previous piece, some at Eastern think the school has an image problem. With the PUB vote out of the way, it is time to focus on other parts of campus. The campus mall is now an empty void, it should be the next project.

To the cherry blossoms that once graced the campus mall, I’m sorry you got sunscald. It was a sad fate for all of you. Your stunning, pink flowers and sweet smell will truly be missed. Nothing put in the mall will be able to match your beauty.

To landscape maintenance, I apologize. My reporting was poor and my opinion came too quickly and was based on a flawed assumption. I appreciate the work done to keep this campus looking beautiful and you deserve more respect than you may receive.