We altered the growth/decay time to reduce stress on the server and increase performance.

Thank you, I feel less crazy for thinking that it was slower then.

I tried asking in global/help chats but there was so much chatter, I didn't really get a clear answer.

I haven't been playing regularly since before the 1.0 release, so this might have just been a change with the patch.  However, I've noticed that trees don't grow at all (I've idled, spent lots of time mining below in the same chunk area, etc.) and a lot of leaves don't decay.  Is this a server thing or a patch change?  The only times I've been able to get trees to grow is with bonemeal.