Funding is another hurdle, Scott said, as municipalities deal with tight budgets lingering from the recession and the expense of fighting the emerald ash borer. Another challenge is a shortage of trees. When the ash borer prompted towns to devote most of their forestry resources to cutting down ash trees, nurseries were left with trees without buyers and destroyed much of the inventory that was too mature to transplant. Now, as towns look to buy trees, nurseries are still trying to catch up with demand.