Paradise Trees / Urban Forest

By April Grossberger

In April of 2008 the Paradise Tree Ordinance and Tree Permit Review Committee was reworded and reorganized. I was the Planning Commission appointee to the Tree Permit Review Committee and this was/is my position statement:

Clearly, this is, for many, a complicated and emotional issue. At all cost, what should be avoided is the erosion of the public trust in its civil servants and appointed and elected officials. We have the ability to create a win/win situation. As planning commissioners, we have the opportunity to work toward a goal of supporting our town staff in their quest to improve services and to reinforce the public trust by letting them know that we are listening. We have here today the chance to act rather than just react.

As town staff noticed, there are many things wrong with our current tree ordinance.Their effort to create a more user friendly document should be applauded. However, I offer that we take this proposed change one step further and echo the most vocal of our populace by requesting the town council create a task force that will work toward the development of a document that does not simply follow legal and/or legislative guidelines but one that also allows for the development and implementation of the most sound and current urban forestry practices available.

Many towns and cities across California have a tree ordinance, tree committee, and the requirement of a permit for the removal of trees. It is not, as has been suggested, only "designer cities" which require a permit for the removal of trees. The Cities of Orinda, San Jose, Simi Valley, Sebastopol, and Cupertino, as well as the Towns of Windsor and Los Gatos are but a few of our sister municipalities currently requiring tree removal permits. Although Paradise is unique in so many ways, our town is not unique in its appointment of a citizen volunteer tree committee. The Cities of Claremont, St. Helena, Redlands, Petaluma, Poway, El Cerrito, and Walnut Creek are but a few of the cities in California currently utilizing the services of a citizen volunteer tree committee.

During my research on this matter, I found that tree committees, tree permits, and tree ordinances can mean many different things. In the Town of Paradise Code of Ordinances, the ordinance that addresses trees, our towns most notable and notorious natural resource, falls under the chapter of Health and Safety. Included in this chapter are such things as Public Nuisance Abatement, Solid Waste Collection, Vending Machine Sales of Tobacco Products, and Alcoholic Beverage Warning Signs. It is my opinion, that, while historically it may have been suitable to organize the tree ordinance under the chapter of Health and Safety, it is now time to give trees their due and assign them their own chapter (four of which have been reserved--4,7,11, and 14--for just such an occasion). Chapter 17 of the City of St. Helena municipal code is titled Trees and Other Vegetation. Like the city of St. Helena, it is entirely possible that, through the creation of a task force, we could guide the development of an ordinance that will stand the test of time as an independent chapter in our town's code of ordinances.

An assortment of tools and resources that can be utilized to evaluate and develop our tree ordinance is available on line through the International Society of Arboriculture at http://www.isa-arbor.com. The ISA describes how the development of a tree ordinance can be incorporated into an overall tree management program. The site includes examples of successful tree ordinances, descriptions of basic methods used to monitor tree resources, and tree management activities. A task force developed to create a new tree ordinance could, for example, be made up of a group of people who represent the Town Council, the Planning Commission, Town Staff, the Fire Safe Council, the Tree Permit Review Committee, the Development/Commercial community, and a citizen at large. (I believe in this so strongly that I will personally commit to volunteer my time to serving on this task force as a representative from either the Planning Commission or the Tree Permit Review Committee.)

Our responsibility as planning commissioners, as we are often reminded, is in part to serve as a decision-making body on land use matters. What we often forget is that we are also to serve as an oversight committee that works to balance staff analysis with community input. Many of our community members have provided their input to staff, to the commission, and to the press. Let's let them know that we are listening by taking the step to retain the current language of the Paradise Municipal Code 8.12 until such time that a newly created task force has submitted an acceptable alternative that includes the retention of a citizen volunteer tree committee and becomes a stand alone chapter in the Town of Paradise Municipal Code of Ordnances.

The time to act is now, not later when a General Plan or Zoning Code update may or may not take place. Let's create a chapter in the Town's history that we can remember with satisfaction and say proudly, "That happened on my watch."