West Seattle Herald reader Mark Schletty shared this story with us regarding a large cedar tree in the 7300 block of California Avenue s.w. that was cut on Sept. 3, a City of Seattle furlough day.

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By Mark Schletty
Friday September 3rd, a day of furlough for City employees, cost West Seattle one of it biggest cedar trees. A tree that should have been protected by Seattle’s Tree Preservation ordinance. Red Cedars can not be cut without a permit if they are 2’ 6” (or larger) in diameter at the 4.5 to 5.5 foot height level. This tree was 2’6” plus or minus several tenths of an inch, depending on how it was measured. Clearly a tree meant to be protected. Please be very alert on furlough days, or we may well lose more protected trees.

My wife and I were having lunch at home when we noticed a large crew of men cutting lower branches on this tree across the street form our house. I went over to ask what their intended task was supposed to be. I was told by the foreman that they were merely trimming around the power lines and a little additional low cutting to improve the home owners view. I said fine and returned home.

Several minutes later we saw them cutting higher than they said they would cut. I returned and asked what they were doing. I was told they were going to cut the tree back higher than they had originally thought. I said they needed a permit and that I wanted to see it. They said they had one (overheard by other neighbors) but they were not going to stop cutting to show it to me. I should call the City to confirm it. I went home and did call the City only to find that they were closed due to furlough.

Meanwhile the cutter started racing to cut to the top of the tree so there would be nothing left to try to save. I returned to try to stop them, and was greeted by a worker telling me they didn’t really have a permit (again overheard by other neighbors) and showing me a copy of the Seattle Tree Preservation ordinance indicating that they didn’t need to have a permit to cut this tree because it was too small for protection. I told them that this tree was so close to the necessary diameter that I wanted the City to measure it to determine the legality of the cut. They told me they would not wait for that and that their foreman was authorized to make that determination. (The people making the money on the cut get to determine the applicability of the ordinance!) But, they said, they would leave enough of the tree to allow the City to measure it this week. I was satisfied.

I did wait to be sure they left the trunk above 5.5 feet in height. When the foreman started the saw and approached the base of the tree I interjected my self between him and the tree and asked what he was doing. He said he was going to cut it to the ground. Notice a pattern of deliberate lying by the cutters to this point? I sure did, and it angered me. I backed to the tree and put my legs against it and told the cutter that he would have to cut me if he intended to cut the tree. He looked at me, bent over and brought the running saw up to about two inches from my shins before he stopped and turned off the saw. As he approached my legs with the saw I started yelling for any of the neighbors and my wife to call the police. They did.

While all this was going on and before the police arrived my wife was proceeding in different ways to try to stop the cutting: taking pictures, calling the management company (the home is a rental unit, the owners live on the East Coast) and the blog. When on the phone with the police the cutter started ranting about “you lazy, overweight slobs with nothing to do but sit around home while I’m working to take care of my family.” My wife pointed out later to him that he ought to watch the assumptions and accusations (she is a professional working from home that day and I’m retired).

Once the officers arrived to try to resolve the situation before it got out of control, the two officers were very good about talking to each of us.

They were limited on their ability to address the situation per their view because it was about preventing violation of an ordinance rather than a criminal law.

So they took the position of trying to get the parties to find a resolution. And of preventing me from violating the trespass laws, allowing them to finish if there was no resolution.

My proposed resolution was to cut out and save the portion of the tree needed to be measured by the city. But it became clear that the cutter wanted the whole trunk to save and use for creating a table and was not willing to lose that income! Finally we had to back off, my wife taking pictures of the measurements to have something to show the city in case it was possible to at least fine the owner for not getting the permit. The circumference of the tree was 8 feet plus or minus a few tenths of an inch – right on the border of the exceptional tree size.

The conclusion was that we lost the tree, and any physical evidence of the violation. We are sending this information to the W S Blog, the Times, the PI, the City and the tree cutting company. We hope that there is some fine for the loss of the tree. We will let the company and city know that the continual lying and deliberate misleading and disparaging comments of the cutter created much of the animosity! And we need to work together with other residents to make sure that these beautiful, 8 foot circumference trees aren’t destroyed without cause!

The rules definitely target too large a diameter for exceptional tree designation. They should not allow the hired cutter to determine the size of the tree, or to perform the cutting on non-working days for the City. And they should criminalize a violation so the police can/will enforce it before it is too late to save the tree. Seattle has already lost too many of its old large trees. They not only provide the beauty that is the reason we live here, but this large tree canopy is important in the production of oxygen all of us need.

Sadly,

Mark Schletty
West Seattle resident

FOLLOW UP

I discussed the tree cutting issue with the Planning Department staff last week and discovered some very interesting information. As per Planning: I could have been arrested for trespassing if I continued to try to save the tree trunk for City measurement. Even the City cannot enter the property to measure the tree without the owner's permission. The City staff would be charged with trespass if they tried to save the tree by entering the property and measuring it. My photos of the tree and the measurements of it are worthless; only City taken measurement and/or photos count. Therefore, once the trunk and stump were removed, the City was totally without recourse. The tree cutting companies know this and frequently cut questionable trees on late Friday afternoons and City furlough or holidays to avoid compliance with the tree preservation ordinance.

According to Planning, neighbors need to be vigilant about large trees and to call them immediately upon seeing anything suspicious.
The City needs time to get staff to the site before the tree is cut too badly to save. This is very hard to achieve. City Council action is needed to change this ordinance to have it become enforceable.

Obviously we, as citizens, need to pressure the City Council on this issue if we truly want to preserve these large old trees. The current
ordinance is functionally impossible to enforce.

Thank you for your attention to this issue. I hope you may be able to influence our citizens to do something about this issue. Our old trees are one of the reasons many of us chose to live in this beautiful city.

The City of Seattle replies:

This response is from Alan Justad in the Department of Planning and Development.

Access to private property by DPD inspectors does require the permission of the owner. This can be a significant hurdle to obtaining evidence to standards we need for taking legal action, such as assessing fines. However, that limitation is a safeguard from government intrusion that most people would support most of the time. Another significant challenge occurs when property owners or tree services time their actions so that DPD inspectors are not available, or when they complete tree removal quickly before it can be inspected by DPD. As for evidence, DPD will use outside evidence from others to corroborate what a City inspector has personally confirmed and recorded, but again for legal purposes our primary evidence must come from an inspection made by an inspector.

All of this makes it difficult to enforce some tree cutting actions. From the report of the neighbor, it is possible that the tree was not quite exceptional by definition, which would mean cutting it might not violate our interim regulations, which allow the cutting of three non-exceptional trees over six inches in diameter each year. Unfortunately, it appears we will not be able to make that determination.

One of the reasons DPD’s August 2010 proposed changes to tree regulations eliminate the prohibition on cutting exceptional trees is the reality that the 2009 interim regulations inadvertently give property owners an incentive to cut down trees that are close to reaching exceptional status, so as to avoid being “stuck” with a protected tree. The new regulations would require trees on single family zoned lots that are being re-developed, and would provide strong incentives to keep existing trees – one large conifer is worth many times the credit of a newly planted tree. This would in fact make exceptional trees a bonus for homeowners looking to redevelop, while giving them flexibility in the meantime to manage their property as needed, including making additions, creating gardens, play areas, etc.

Finding the right balance is the big challenge, but a recent study of our canopy indicates that owners of existing homes in Seattle are not clear-cutting the places where they live and raise their families. They manage their sites instead. It’s with new development that we’ve seen the big losses, and we want to get ahead of that with the new regulations.

Alan Justad
Deputy Director, DPD