Guest column by Camille McCormack: City needs better process before cutting down heritage trees
Published in the August 23 – Sept. 5, 2017 issue of Gilroy Life
By Camille McCormack
Camille McCormack
My family has lived in Gilroy for several generations, and I know firsthand that our community has long valued its natural beauty — in particular, our heritage trees. But you wouldn’t know it by the city’s recent decision to cut down 235 trees around town without much in the way of public input. The recent public outcry about the city council’s impulsive decision was mostly about saving these trees. But it was also about government transparency, a serious conflict of interest, and unaccounted-for environmental impacts.
I know many Gilroy residents join me in mourning the loss of these mature trees that helped to define our city’s character. After all, Gilroy is a designated Tree City USA, a title that reflects a demonstrated commitment to the degree to which we value trees. Trees are a symbol of civilization, an investment in our future. A Greek proverb that was beloved by my late father states, “A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in.”
Although it is too late to save the trees that were recently removed, I hope that others will join me in pushing the city council to do a better job of ensuring a reasonable and fair process for making decisions about our heritage trees before any more are cut down.
The Gilroy City Council voted May 1 to approve funding to remove 235 trees, including many of the city’s prized street trees as well as trees in our city parks and along Uvas Creek. Tree removal on this scale has a significant impact on the environment, including on air quality and temperatures in the creek. Yet the council approved the project without even discussing environmental impacts.
The city council also failed to alert the community that they were about to make a decision that would affect hundreds of trees. The council’s agenda item that led to the approval of this massive tree removal project was described simply as “tree maintenance.” Does this imply cutting down heritage trees to you, or does it sound like the city plans to allocate funding to take care of these trees? Because of this poor public communication, residents were denied an opportunity to express concerns about the tree removal plan.
Furthermore, the arborist who evaluated the health of these trees and recommended their removal was also awarded the contract to perform the work. This is a clear conflict of interest, since the arborist company stood to profit from its recommendation. To add insult to injury, a local independent arborist has indicated that even if removal of these trees had been necessary — which is a controversial conclusion — the work could have been done for about half of the cost paid by the city.
The city council denied my request to meet with them to address my concerns about the tree removal plan and the process used to approve it. My concern for these trees was so significant that I took the city to court to try to delay the tree removal until an independent third party could offer a second opinion on the health of the trees. This issue meant so much to me that I spent $45,000 of my own money to bring it before a judge. Unfortunately, the court allowed the tree removal to move forward, causing irreparable harm to our city.
Heritage trees provide so many benefits to a community. Beyond their beauty, their cultural value and their overall contribution to our quality of life and to the character of our town, they also provide practical benefits. According to the Arbor Day Foundation, these include cleaner air, shade, energy savings, and storm water management, not to mention wildlife habitat and protection of creek-side soils.
The city has replanted crepe myrtles, which are more bush than tree, in place of some of the tall shade trees that were removed. These plants will never grow to a height to provide the shady canopy of the trees they were planted to replace.
We still have a lot of wonderful trees left in Gilroy, so we need to establish a better process to protect them. Proper stewardship of these trees through drought and other environmentally stresses is both possible and proper. If our city council wants to make this type of dramatic change again, it should obtain a second professional recommendation as to whether the trees can be saved, making outright removal a last, not a first, choice. The city must also give the public an opportunity to weigh in on a decision of this scale. Because while our elected officials come and go, our trees — when properly cared for — shape our city for generations.
Camille McCormack is a longtime Gilroy resident. She filed a lawsuit in May in the Santa Clara County Superior Court against the city of Gilroy, challenging the city’s decision to remove 235 trees.
