Safety Harbor Draft Tree Ordinance Passes First Test
By 
Safety Harbor’s proposed draft tree ordinance has been in development for the better part of eight months, as the five city commissioners worked hard to craft a document “with teeth” designed to protect the city’s tree canopy.
Last night, the commissioners came one step closer to completing their long-awaited task by voting to approve, on first reading, six separate ordinances within the main draft tree ordinance.
Five of the items passed unanimously, while one (2015-03) passed by a 4-1 vote, with Commissioner Rick Blake voting against it..
The end result of what Mayor Andy Steingold called “the longest piece of legislation I have ever worked on (in) my ten years up here” is an ordinance that should protect the city’s tree canopy while at the same time levying replacement requirements and fees on residents and developers who look to remove protected trees in town.
While recent compromises by the commissioner led to Monday’s initial vote of approval, there are still a few aspects of the ordinance that they do not agree on, namely the fees imposed on residents who look to remove protected trees from their property.
“You think our fees are too low, I think they’re too high,” Commissioner Carlos Diaz said, directing his comment to Commissioner Andy Zodrow. “I like our ordinance, but I’d like to see the fees go down a little bit.”
Commissioner Blake concurred.
“I also think that the (fee) schedule that we have right now is entirely too high,” he said.
As the document stands right now, protected trees may only be removed for three reasons:
- the tree poses a safety hazard
- it is weakened by age, fire or other injury
- in order to construct improvements to the property (i.e. adding a pool or a patio)
Should a property owner wish to remove a tree for any of these reasons, they would be required to file a $25 permit application fee with the City.
If the permit was approved, the applicant would have to plant replacements in a ratio based on the tree’s diameter at breast height (DBH), or pay an inch-for-inch replacement fee, which starts at $20 per inch and climbs to $100 per inch for trees with a 40-inch or greater DBH.
The heavy dose of fees and restrictions being imposed on residential property owners is what led Blake to vote against Ordinance 2015-03.
“Originally the verbiage was in there and we took it out, and I’d like to put it back in where it states if the lot meets the minimum requirement of trees already existing on the lot, then they wouldn’t have to pay fines to have them removed,” Blake said.
When Vice Mayor Cliff Merz added that he also “had a problem” with the table and the fees, Mayor Steingold said that even if the ordinance is approved on second reading on March 16, it won’t be the last time the matter is brought before City Hall.
“If this ordinance should pass I will guarantee you that we will be back up here discussing it in the next sixth months to a year, trying to figure it out and tweak it a little bit, because that’s how it always works,” the mayor said.
“I guarantee there is something tonight that we are missing. We didn’t see it,” he added. “So I imagine we will be discussing this down the road.”
Related content:
- Safety Harbor Tree Ordinance Inches Closer To Completion
- Commission Agrees on Tree Ordinance, Splits Over Arborist Hiring
- Commissioners Clash Over Tree Removal Fees
- Town Hall Tree Meeting Unites Safety Harbor Residents, Commissioners
- Safety Harbor Tree Ordinance Another Step Towards Completion
- Safety Harbor Tree Moratorium Approved, Effective Immediately
- Commission Calls For Calm Amid Tree Removal Rancor
- Protest to Precede Tree Workshop Tonight In Safety Harbor
- Safety Harbor Explores Moratorium On Removing Trees
- SHCC Calls for Clearer Language, Higher Fees At Tree Ordinance Workshop
- City Commission Looks To Add “Teeth” To Tree Ordinance
*Note: Commissioner Rick Blake owns the parent company of Safety Harbor Connect.
Please explain the verbiage “protected trees”. Also, if I have a tree that meets the requirements to be removed, & I have 25 trees on my lot, why do I have plant more if I remove the tree?
Cheryl Becker
Cheryl, in the document on the city website it says that protected trees include “any living native shade tree or Sabal Palmetto (Cabbage or Sabal Palm) having a DBH of 4 inches or greater.” DBH is the “diameter at breast height,” or 4.5 feet above the ground. And you shouldn’t have to plant more (especially not inch for inch!) if your property is already full of trees, but that’s exactly the kind of common sense exception they choose to ignore when making these ridiculous, burdensome rules.
Thank goodness we got the permits (which was already incredibly difficult to do) and removed our (dangerous, rotting) trees a few weeks ago! To put this in perspective, under these rules we would have had to either plant 10-20 expensive saplings (on our less than quarter-acre which is already mostly covered by house, shed, garden, and more trees), or pay replacement fees exceeding $5500. We’re a young couple with small children and a tight budget, and we would literally not have been able to afford to remove large dying trees which were posing a serious danger to our children and our home! How about putting people before trees for once, Mr. Zodrow?
Question. If I want to remove a (protected) tree from my property, and none of the 3 conditions listed in the article exist, am I allowed to remove the tree?
The answer to your question is no, Dawn. Protected trees may only be removed if they meet one of those three criteria. Thank you for the comment.