testing here it is this is Oh this is in compliance with the open public meetings act 1975 adequate notice of this meeting has been provided please rise for the pledge
i pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all who's going to call the role
carol J present Shane is excused who is Shane excuse George A here uh Carol York is here the
other Carol here barb here joelle is he did Joelle contact you at all this is the second meeting in a row that he's he's missed i saw him and he said he was coming but
obviously not jim well yes tracy present frank present ron present thank you you all have the minutes of the March 11th meeting um take a moment or two
i'll entertain a motion to pass with any changes uh changes or corrections to be made i just would like to correct for the record about 1117 Ohio when when we addressed Mrs king's concerns i did
bring up that we had prior to this situation um made a motion at that previous meeting that any street tree had to be voted on by all commissioners i don't see that that's noted in that but that did come the last time discussion no but
that's you said do we have any corrections to the minutes that's that's what I would suggest I think Mrs kang is here right i am yes I'm here all right we'll talk about that anybody have any corrections any
changes to the minutes of the March 11th meeting I'll entertain a motion to approve as presented other than what I just said I don't have any other changes as amended what do we have who uh George amended the minutes
okay do you vote to approve as they're amended yes i'll make a motion to approve it amended how oh uh this of the hope for removal of a street tree the whole
commission has to approve at least well the majority of the Yeah of the question to then that's that's been a that's been established for several years but then we don't have to put it as an amendment no but I just wanted to make sure that it was noted that it was brought up again when Judy when Judy comes up right
but I just wanted to say that that was brought up again at last month's meeting okay i have a motion to approve as amended i can make the motion as amended yes I'll make that motion what's a second i'll second all right okay all
those in favor i I any opposed any abstensions all right yes sir i I was just absent so I just thought I'd abstain um for uh those minutes what I was absent for that
meeting so I was abstaining tracy record show that there was one abstension two two record all right all right we have some uh members of the
public here let's talk about 1117 Ohio Avenue first and press the button there you go yes you're Judy King correct i am Judy King yes from 1117 Ohio Avenue concerned
about the sweet gumball tree that is lifting the sidewalk tremendously we've replaced the sidewalk already three times um we've had the house since 2020 uh it needs to has to get done
again it is a real threat to the public um so and I understand everybody was supposed to come look at it to tell me their opinion did that happen what yes I did I know you did Carol i know you I did
carol did george did george did and I looked at it also did you look at it okay yeah all right and you can see how badly not only is it affecting my sidewalk now it's affecting my neighbor's sidewalk it's affecting both sidewalks um and we had replaced the
neighbor's sidewalk once it's expensive to keep replacing this and this tree is the roots are not going to stop on this tree and I'm so afraid when they do our street next year okay they've done the upper part of Ohio
they're doing the bottom part next year it's going to create so many problems it's affecting the street the curb it's on the other side of our our our side of the street after the payment it's going into there it's going into our sewer
sewer and water lines um and it's unsafe um I actually even pulled up your regulations section C in your regulations say any tree with roots that are aggressive or difficult i'm thinking
yes um that they're interfering with pl plumbing or other uh problems they should be removed um and that's in your guidelines i also pulled up your list of trees that are recommended um and you
still have the sweet gumball tree on here most cities all over the United States have taken it off because at one time I guess there was abundance when the oak trees all died a long time ago and they put the sweet gumball trees in
place but they're not good for se city streets trees if they're on an open field they're fine because the root system can go but it's not working i don't mind replacing the sidewalk again but I can't keep replacing it every 5 years that's not
fair to us it's a big expense well we haven't reached a point yet where we're getting permission to plant city trees on private property uh we're limited in the spaces we have to plant the trees well I didn't think that was
private property and public parks isn't that your Isn't I'm not allowed to touch that tree out there that's the tree the city's responsible the city owns that tree right city is responsible for maintenance and removal right okay now
as trees well you know this as trees mature they take up more space and they damage sidewalks and the roots extend into the street right the damage they say to you was done three times i don't remember doing three requests for that
particular Oh I've never requested we just We just went ahead and had it done okay you just come up did you ever participate in a 50/50 program uh the first time I think we did the 50/50 program because we had carrot top out
when we were doing landscaping when we bought the house it needed to have a lot of work done so we had we were doing a lot of landscaping and we investigated with him along with a few other people we went with McGarity and set a carrot is that a yes or a no
did you participate in the 50 i think one time one time well this is maybe a chance to do it a second time well the other two times his prices are so much more expensive his 5050 is as much as paying somebody
outright to do it well the the program right now because the city manager is accumulating all these requests it may be that it's not going to cost you 50% it may be it's not going to cost you anything the city will have
a contract out and repair all the sidewalks with one two or three contractors however he wants to however he wants to do it so I would suggest you put your request in with God to have the sidewalk repaired under the I can do
that but that's still not because the tree is the tree is in perfect i mean I mean it's big and it's getting bigger but it's in perfect health and we Oh it's not in perfect health do you see the growth all going up this tree and
the the gang roots you can say the same things for leaves pine cones any type of seed pods that come off a tree we probably the only the only the only u uh remedy for this put plastic trees in
u that's not going to work no they tried that they tried that in Wildwood but the plastic palm trees uh well I don't want plastic trees listen I'm a big member of the garden club i was institutional in working with getting the water tower
cleaned up and we planted a tree down there at my insistence so it's not like I don't like trees or I don't want trees okay but this is a public hazard to the people that are running people run they they walk their dogs um
it's a tripping hazard a very bad habit restructuring of Ohio Avenue which is nearly complete now right the only the first three blocks they're going to do the next three blocks next year we're in the next section well when they take
those you you play around you mess around with tree roots cut tree roots the tree is going to fall toward the cut side okay so the tree isn't going to fall i doubt very much can I speak here for public work side please so Mrs keen here saying that she's already replaced
sidewalk three times she's saying it's going into our water and sewer line which is creating a health hazard now she's asking for the city shade tree to actually take the tree down i believe a bunch of you guys all went out and looked at the tree correct mhm so at this point in time it's starting to be a health hazard because it's impading into
our water line or sewer line now you're talking about reconstruction of the street next year and that tree may fall now into possibly houses and cars next year so if she wants the tree done now why don't we take a vote and take that tree out she's willing to plant another
tree a more suitable tree in that location than what's out there now so I think that's probably might be the best solution here do you have documentation that the tree roots are going into the shoreline and water line yeah um our landscaper who was McGarity yes it's
it's creeping in and you can actually see the talking about a sprinkler system or water lines the sewer line I'm talking about the sewer lines are all that you can see the roots all growing right into the going right up but what I'm saying is certain places in the in
the city the water table I know in my section of town the water table's only you go down 18 inches and you hit water mhm i had to have my shoreline replaced four years ago not even four years ago and they dug down they when they put a
shoreline in they don't put it 18 in down they put it down 3 to 4 feet under the ground there were no tree roots whatsoever involved in that shoreline so many cases when there's an issue with the shoreline sometimes the roots have nothing to do with that's what I'm asking but I think what's happened this
tree the roots have been the roots are just coming up to the surface they're not down real low down real deep the way they were before did you get a chance to look at it to see you can see the roots even if you look on the other side of the sidewalk going onto our lawn you can
see the roots all going through there it's not like they're not going there the roots coming up in the yard and the street right all the trees in Cape May are like that i don't Have you ever walked down Washington Street oh I'm constantly perry Street or North Street
well and I just got done tell I last year I was telling you how our church just got sued because somebody fell on something that was a quarter of an inch up so um yes I I understand that but I'm responsible for this property okay i'm
the one paying to have this fixed all the time we take good care of our lawn we take good care of the house i I don't think it's fair that I have to keep replacing sidewalks in order to make it safe for the public to walk i I understand what you're saying about all
of this but this is Kate May it is all about all of the trees in Kate May on Washington Street and so forth have roots coming out people have to replace their sidewalks again and again but and their shorelines and their but they know when they move in and they take a
sidewalk in they have a sidewalk in front of their house they might encounter this problem if they've got a big tree with big tree roots and if we say we're going to kill every tree or uproot every tree that's in the city like that like yours we don't have a
shade tree city anymore i I agree with you i also have just six feet from that tree I have another city tree okay um and I'm not asking for that to come down i'm not asking for this tree to come down because I don't like trees or
because I'm asking because it's unsafe but all the sidewalks there's many sidewalks in Kate May that are like that and do you feel that's great for the public no and if it's a public hazard no but people do repair their sidewalks they take care of it but I How many
times am I to repair this i don't know i mean it's your property I guess i mean if somebody falls on it is the city going to be responsible that could happen anywhere in the city with every one of our trees you know and I'm I'm
all I'm trying to do is what's best for Kate May and I don't think it's in Kate May's interest to have sidewalks that are raising up and down i don't see how that's in anybody's best interest that's Kate May we've got it all over the town
i feel that people are more important than trees okay i think we need trees i'm willing to put another not that same kind of tree if we feel we need another one there I will do that um can I interject here for just a second because I did stop out and look at the tree
thank you one of the things that that they're doing a lot in other cities and we've tried to get people in Kate May to do it but they've been reluctant is to go out and come around with a semiircle we've talked to the sidewalk
to get the sidewalk further away from the tree so you don't have that problem we've talked about that when we had the when we had the sidewalk done last time they didn't feel we had enough space so I guess maybe if we bring the sidewalk over into the our yard more
that but I don't think there's enough space to do it any other way i think I looked at it and I thought that there was enough space okay to that i've looked at several trees in the past month but if I remember correctly I that was going to be my suggestion that you
just semi-ircle it around a tree get it away from the trunk of the tree it's the trunk of the tree that's actually lifting the the sidewalk up right the the the flare is what's actually so if you move that and bring it in a semicircle around it you'll alleviate
that problem but if we come in so far it's going to give me a very narrow sidewalk there unless I move it around into our property more so on the you know the that's generally what would have to happen it would have to semicircle into your property a little bit and then it's if they do that it's
not going to happen again i'm not going to have to replace it i'm not going to say that absolutely it's not going to happen again but it's it should alleviate the problem okay you think so mhm ron can the sidewalk be raised instead of cutting it out and yeah it
could hump hump it up a little bit up and over before you make that statement or check on ADA compliance before you make any statements about anything like that you got 88 compliance on that you can't just raise a sidewalk up two inches you have ADA compliance on that so I would I would advise not say
anything on that but we already are getting when it rains and gets really bad we get water this deep on the sidewalk now I'm not going to say it doesn't dissipate it does but because the other sidewalks up so much it all just runs down closer to our driveway
side so we have the whole sidewalk is wet constantly um and we go out I sweep it because I I don't want people getting hurt so we sweep the water away as much as we can and our front is not low i mean we
get water in our backyard sometimes at the very back but we don't have any our It's not low in the front anybody else have any other comments on this i will make a comment that I agree with Ron that we could try to solve to go one
step first to make to see if he can do what he said he can do with the roots away from the sidewalk and then do the sidewalk repair and then see how that goes that's my that's my opinion i would just make one comment Jay um
couple weeks ago Paul and and myself walked two blocks on Ohio the two blocks that are under construction right now and we identified trouble trees that might be a problem when they were doing the
resurfacing and the curbing and I would suggest that maybe in next year when your block of Ohio is under construction we can do the same thing and further identify if it's still a problem for the
and I and I think that's great that's fine but isn't it better to be proactive or no because I don't see how it's not going to be a problem you know you have to realize Mrs king that we're for the trees well and so am we're for Kate May
so am I i'm not not for the trees give the tree a chance yeah let it let it if if I remember correctly from the class I was just at from Ruckers we maybe should look at getting a tree harbor in here because if these roots are coming out of ground more and more there's a problem with that tree that's
the character of the tree but that is true but also if the roots keep growing more and more out of that ground there's also a possible health issue with that tree as in Ruckers I just literally just took a class on it six months ago yeah maybe we want to look at getting two arouses in here to have two sides of an arborist say hey look there's something
wrong with this tree here and we need to take care of it take care of it now before it does fall or whatever every tree in Cape May would it hurt to get an arous to look at it i mean there's certain trees that have the surface roots like that we don't plant silver maples anymore but we're not cutting them down just because they have large
roots there's one on Broadway the roots come out of the ground without exaggeration about 14 to 16 in up right the sidewalk has been replaced it's not a trip hazard that tree's been standing for how long i don't even know and that
even when that house was being redone about 14 years ago they had requested removing that tree because of that issue all we did was have them put a new sidewalk in and so far there has not been another issue with that so my question is then is how many times have we how many times has that homeowner put
sidewalk in that location one time correct i don't know i haven't They haven't applied for anything else but Mrs ke saying this is our third time getting ready to do it for sidewalk so there has to be an issue why this roots keep coming up up up out of ground it's not getting enough going to ground what I think maybe we should you guys should
look at getting arburist in here before anything else because well and our own arborist who does all our trees because we get them trimmed in the back because we have old trees he he Matt Notch has said it needs to come
down now I don't know how you value Matt but I think he's a great arborist well what we do is refer to our certified tree expert and that's who we typically get for that we get Mickey Rians in for that but I don't see I mean there's certain trees that have prominent
surface roots that species is one of them the other one I mentioned and they're going to stay on the surface well there are six or seven right in my little block okay none of the other ones have lifted the sidewalk the way this one is it's not like that and there's
another one on my neighbor's property that I take care of it's not lifting the sidewalk there's two across the street they're not lifting the sidewalk there's another one down the street they're not doing to the sidewalk what this one's doing what kind of trees are they are they all the same they're the sweet gum
well we pardon me they are the same trees they're sweet gums there's a lot of them on our street um you know yes it's a a pain in the neck to clean up all the little cat little things that fall all
the time but that's not the issue it's the safety issue here people run at night people People are out running all the time i am deathly afraid that somebody's going to get hurt once again though that exists all
over the city i mean I walk down Washington Street that's a hazard waiting to happen but I figured this is my town were for the trees i'm going to put up with it yes and and yes if I fell I would not sue
but how many people sue for every little thing and that happened at our church but that's trees i mean they could sue you for an acorn fall falling on their head from a tree but this is Look at it you can see the liability just looking at it
like I said I'm I mean like Carol said we're for the trees i I can't see killing a tree robbing it of its life because of these things the trees do that's what they do and we are a shade tree commission because we have a lot of trees in our
city it's one thing that does make that's that's one of the things that makes Cape May unique is that we have the tree canopy you to go to Avalon you go to Stone Harbor you go to Wildwood you don't have that true and that's why we've been a tree city for so many years
because we we try to preserve the trees every chance we can and and I understand that 43 also taking good care of these trees i think the trees need to be taken better care of that are on the street they need to be trimmed more often um if we're not
supposed to do this stuff like I said every two years I have to trim i have a black pine in the back and I have an old holly tree in the back i'm not going to take them down they're gorgeous trees but they're pains in the neck but we work with it and every two year Matt comes and he trims them to keep them
safe that doesn't happen with these trees they're cut all over they look ugly not this particular one because it's not in the lines but my neighbor across the street that has the sweet gum what they didn't do to that tree when they came along and cut it for the lines
it's horrible well that's another issue we're talking about at this meeting too that's that has nothing to do with us that's through the Atlantic City election i understand that i understand i you know listen I'm going to abide by whatever you say but I just feel that
it's very unfair and anybody walking on the street can see how unsafe that is it's not You walk on the street you don't see the other sidewalks all raised up from the sweet gum trees i mean I live in Lafayette and we repaved and we
all got new sidewalks and any of the trees that were impeding onto the sidewalk they went around the new sidewalk was around went around to save the tree to save the trees and did that solve the problem yeah solve the problem but you you say there's not enough room
to arc the sidewalk into the yard well we can put it into the yard if that's what the city wants us to do it would I think it would have to be i But I don't know that for sure there's enough room there there is enough room there to do it to to
semi-circle it around a tree which would get it another foot or two in uh so you're only looking at taking another foot or two what's that i don't have a problem with that as long as it's going to work and it's not going to then still keep uprooting the sidewalk
i think that would alleviate the problem would I 100% guarantee it no but well nobody 5% nobody can guarantee guarantee anything so So then you think I should go to the city and ask the city to What were you telling me to get on the city's
list put in for a put in for a sidewalk repair all right well now are they going to do that before they do our street the what before they replace because they're going to be doing the whole road do they want to do that before that
she would like for me to I mean next year the road's going to be done we don't know so yes if you Mr dietrich apologizes he uh couldn't make it but Justin Riggs I'm the deputy city manager so we are looking at a citywide
um initiative as was discussed here to replace sidewalks this sidewalks probably would not be replaced before the mill and paving work that would be work together okay on on that
project on Ohio Avenue okay i don't know that I can wait a year i think they're suggesting is to give your information to I will Miss Anderson okay and then Mr ter can certainly take a look at it but
I believe the commission I I don't want to speak for the commission but sounds like they're saying the tree has to stay but look at other avenues okay okay i'll go by the city's recommendation
well we can take a vote on it i'll entertain a motion to remove the street tree uh in front of uh 1117 Ohio Avenue because of uh u the conditions that Judy King described
uh you can agree with that and we'll issue order to remove the tree or disagree with it and we will wait then until a street is done next year uh and uh um and then take it under advisement again to see what we have to do uh but I
would suggest in the meantime you put your application in with uh with Ketta our secretary uh for for sidewalk repair okay do I have a second for the motion
are you making a motion to remove the tree or preserve the tree to remove it if you want do that one again J pardon what are you What are you making i'm making a motion to remove the tree do I have a second i'll second it to remove to
remove it well we can vote no all those in favor all those opposed okay and put your application in for sidewalk repair and we'll deal with it once they when the city lets it
contract for sidewalk uh resurfacing done as I said right now I don't think it's going to be a 50/50 uh program that the city is going to repair the whole all the sidewalks at their own expense if they're tree damage tree root damage okay
now sour gum balls uh seed balls and stuff fallen that's a natural event oh it is i know can't do anything with it i pick them up daily i know that that's a natural thing and I don't I'm not complaining about
that part of it i'm not saying it's not a pain but again and I pick them up because I don't want people falling on them i'm out there constantly cleaning them up so
um where is Hetta what office is she in okay what and I'll do this tomorrow is that what I should do okay i can come tomorrow all right thank you thank you all right thank you thank you and Cleveland
is there an Cleveland here cleveland dan here we go state your name and address dan Daniel Eelman and I'm here about 717 Washington Street okay and you're appealing uh for a tree just to the left of your porch
down the street here on uh Washington Street right exactly i was here to uh ask you to reconsider if I'd be able to remove this tree and plant something else somewhere on the property um in its place
well this is where we normally defer to the uh district commissioner and uh but lately we've been also trying to have either Jay or myself as chairman and vice chairman take a look at each tree that's put in for the removal um the commissioner is in favor of keeping the
tree as it is i would rather see that this is just my opinion the tree has some issues because of past pruning and it has um to me what appears to be some rot at the base so I would not have an issue with removing that tree as long as
there was another tree replaced however we have now gotten to a point where um we since we have two people looking at it with two different opinions we're going to have to at least I think everybody's going to have to vote on
this tree look at it we have Okay you've got in your package you got in your package of goods uh the application um and it's a tree just it's a holly tree it's a it's got a a co-ominant trunk so it's a double trunk right and
at the base of the trunk there's some issues but I mean it is leafed out it's just there are some issues with the tree in my opinion but with that type of that type of a co-owner trunk you can't you couldn't take just one trunk down oh no uh no um that tree is in my district yes
I looked at it um what are the issues that you are concerned about well it's just been pruned improperly over the years it was topped at some point but there's also some rot at at the uh juncture of the of the two uh I also see that it's right next to the driveway
going into the sturdy bank yes well that's that has that has no imply it wouldn't No there's no interference yeah that's inside the fence that is not um I understand what George is saying but again I'm a tree person all these
trees are like people to me i I say that bush is now leafing it out the the holly tree bush is now leafing out and my opinion is it should be let alone let it exist as long as it can i mean it's giving some beauty to
your yard i know you're not in favor of what it looks like but I don't see cutting a tree down because it's not pretty so I I'm in favor of leaving it there and letting it live out its life i don't think it's imposing on anything
that was my opinion that's why I wrote what I did yeah absolutely um and of course I would be willing to plant another tree on the property that would Well people come in i think everybody we've seen in here who's had an appeal says "I like trees i'm gonna plant
another one." Doesn't happen it just doesn't happen and that again is is is destroying the beauty of the city yes I'll take a tree down and I will put another one guy said he was going to put 12 in i have yet to see that um I think
we need code enforcement to go around somehow and see if these trees are replanted within a certain amount of time and if they aren't the person should be fined or something there's something about that in the ordinance but it doesn't happen
people don't plant the trees so what do we do well that's going to have to I'm not saying you wouldn't i'm not saying I was going to say I appreciate that but I'm not everybody right i'm not saying you would but there's so many people yeah you can take the tree out never another tree in its place
so it's making me get very discouraged which I understand right i mean I say take it down or some of us say take it down and other people say you come in here and you appeal it and it never and it comes down yeah everyone loves trees but not the tree in front of my house in
fact I I don't love that anymore when I came here I thought that there would be some regulatoriness on what you're saying and that I would have to show you I planted another tree first that was actually in my frame of mind coming here
well that's the thing that we're going to have to discuss too we have to have followup with the district commissioner who you know of those properties where the tree replacements are supposed to be given and that would have to be something that's going to be another you know followup thing and probably followed with code enforcement like we
did down on Patterson you know but excuse me i think maybe rather than fall on all of us all the time to do that i mean we could give the addresses to code for it's there or it's not there and then you ch or find them and we made sure we stayed on top of
those trees trees we had those trees removed and the proper trees plant and that was excellent if we know about it and that was good but there's so many that are not followed up and we don't
have the trees back i mean why are we here why are we a shade tree commission if we keep taking down all these trees and giving into appeals and nothing ever gets planted in its place and we don't let the trees at least try to live out their
life i mean I mean yeah there could be some kind of illness but it may not it may not kill the tree well can I can I can I make a little help here obviously we have the code enforceer who does a great job here in city of KM Mag but as a
committee as well in your in your district there why can't you guys help out as well hey this person hasn't hasn't plant a tree and let the code of force know because these guys here are so busy as well too i mean if you guys are That's what I said i think each district commissioner is going to have to follow up with him because like I
said he's know everything and you know we're volunteers but we're volunteers i mean I I follow up now there's no reason as far as trees that's that's
ours right so that's okay but I I get I get I get your volunteers but same token too we also volunteer to look at trees need to be taken care of too right you're saying you're volunteer when a gentleman or lady has a problem with the tree we go out and look at the
tree so in 6 months why can't we also help out code enforcement hey it's my head here six months or three months hey D we plant a tree and report back doesn't even have to be right all he needs is a list he really I think just
needs a list and he can go out and follow it up so what are we discussing we have a lot of pardon me what are we disc we got now now now we're into Well I have a question for you what are we discussing here uh whether we do we allow approval to take the double trunk holly tree down
which is reasonably healthy although uh you discovered that there was some rot at the base well I or and to and plant another tree of one type for another that really concern us what type of tree he puts in as long as he replaced the
tree well we would give suggestions about or from our tree list you know we would give those suggestions but um so what do we want to do how do we want to proceed with this do we want to have everybody take a look at it take a look at it yeah okay i think we're gonna have to start doing that with these removals
all right so we're gonna keep this over to Sorry Daniel but we'll keep this over to Don't be sorry and but everybody take a look everybody take a look at that tree 717 Washington Street as you pull in to the uh the drive-thru for the bank
it's just to your right right just to the left of the front porch at 717 okay it used to be a Antonet breakfast antuinette bed and breakfast yeah okay still called Antonetses no or did you
name it after you name it after yourself it's nameless it's nameless nameless just like most of the homes in Cape May now i I I'm sorry i don't know your name um Carol but Carol uh um I'm very local in
town you know he knows who I am if I'm will you know he's going to enforce that I plant another tree i'd hope that you consider that thanks thank you i'll look at it now thanks for coming in thanks you on your microphone on this Ann Cleveland
application denial this is in your district yes um does Could you Ron did you take a look do you have I don't know if you have a copy of it i have a copy of it you can't look at that i can't I can't by looking at this figure out what kind of tree that is
it's possibly a malberry it looks like from the picture like it's a malberry what are we talking about the the tree yeah looks like it's of an age that it's not throwing any mulberries anymore i got something well it's not the time of season to know
whether it's out mberries or not new York ask me that in August but it looks despite despite the fact that it's a little mishap and kind of a double trunk twisted by the wind it's still looks like a reasonably healthy tree if
if I may yeah I was out there um had the permission from um Dave Schultz who was the architect um it was not in a direct line of the garage in question right so that was a that was an important factor but when I saw the tree I have a couple
of those trees in my backyard and um they are what uh malberry malberry and yes there is a twisted root uh bark uh behind the tree but I thought the tree was brilliant and I think there was a
lot of growth and um art arterial energy leading up to the top boughs of this tree so um my it look like there's plenty of space a lot of disturbed root drip drip area around that tree yes yeah so it's it should be it's huge getting
plenty of water yes yes yeah it has quite a receptor yes yeah and and uh and mind you is you know I went in objectively as I told um as I told Mr schultz and I also said
that uh this committee does um determinations uh by commission and I said that's the best way to do it uh and I actually uh advised the architect that um I'm
kind of a newbie to this commission and uh but I I'm coming in objectively and uh I I made my observational determination and took extra pictures with uh my jacket
and you you see what you see there and if you uh counter me fantastic that's but we do it by commission and I and that's the way I'd like to continue to move forward well I should think we lost left the
denial in this particular case we'll leave the denial stand thank you do we everybody in agreement with that yes yes agree and if Mrs cleveland wants to come in again next time to appeal this again I
will do it over again all right Harbor Day volunteers who's going to go and read well I called the school no one's gotten back to me yet i gave them my information they said they would contact me about going in and reading the story like I did last year and I think Carol
said you might be interested in doing the same this is going to be on it doesn't have to be a certain day yeah can't do it till after April going to be on the 28 28th right or somewhere around there i don't think they probably care
as long as somewhere around there anybody else hey Ron you can go in and read a book to the [Laughter] school okay um we have some other things but Okay so
we're just going to have two two or three people go in and read books on Arub Day all right uh three less recommendations excuse me we have another member the Do you have something that you want well
would you come forward please and if you would just turn the thing on and state your name oh that's okay press the button there you go i got it my name's Diana Vera i'm at 1302 Ohio Avenue um we were told that someone was going to come look at our tree you did
okay that's all I needed to know your friend no I'm Diana my husband's Fran he's out of town so I'm here and I called him several times um and for whatever reason what is your name george george okay there must be a block on his number or some some kind of I know it's
spin back and forth back and forth back and forth so I will go and take another look at that because when I went it was everything was blocked i couldn't even get like in front of So when I talked to your husband uh his concern was that the roots on the north side of the tree were
cut and he was curious about what the impact that would have on the tree the front of the tree the roots were completely cut and on both sides the roots were completely cut so it's a concern what when when was that done
when what is it oh just about it was like last month when they were redoing that section doing construction which they're still doing construction you're not you're not I do not know probably not going to see any dieback for a year no so if the if the roots are severely cut where it can't it can't pick up the
groundwater uh you will see some dieback on the tree and it may be that that tree has been compromised but you won't see that for a year maybe two okay all right so keep a watch on that and you're going to go take another yeah I'll take a look at it too and I had mentioned to
your husband that if in fact cutting the roots was going to affect the tree I was going to check with the commission to make sure that it wouldn't happen immediately i think it's a process if the the life of the tree has been endangered by cutting the roots it would take several years before you would know
it was going to die it's a big tree yeah it is it's a really big tree bradford pear I believe oh oh what oh really bradford pear it's beautiful it's absolutely beautiful it's bloomed now love the tree i don't want to see the
tree gone it's just immensely big i I don't even know how to to say it for our property my only concern my husband's only concern is the tree across the street is a Bradford pair and during these lovely
wind weather situations that we have their tree split it split sorry and fell on a car oh was it a street tree it's on their property oh it's on the property it's on the property now is this one that you're talking about on the property or is it a
street tree it's a street tree it's on the right near the curb right where they're doing it's between the sidewalk sidewalk and the curb right between the sidewalk and the curb yes yeah that's a street tree i can make a suggest tree right Jay if I could make a suggestion
uh we could reduce the canopy back on that tree to take some of the windsail effect and also it entices their roots to start regrowing uh so that can be done also we've done it to several other Bradford pairs yeah Bradford pears they
can be a beautiful tree but we don't recommend using them anymore because they are prone to breaking like that their branch structure is such that in those wind storms all the it goes up all the branches come off in one spot and when the tree is five six seven eight
years old looks beautiful like a lollipop tree uh but after it gets a little bit 10 12 15 years old the branches start splitting off well then they just came and cut them all no it's just the way it
looks is a shame but your tree so was Atlantic City Electric cut them not happy with the job that they did either because one of the I I don't know whose truck it was it was a truck obviously it was either a construction
truck or Atlantic City when they were cutting the tree must have backed into the tree and now all the bark's off one side of the trunk so it's all exposed so the the poor tree has just been compromised to a point where I'm parked
in the driveway and my husband's parked in the driveway there is no other place to park that tree falls it's gone on a car mhm and that's my only concern i love the tree it is absolutely beautiful if you saw it right now it's just like oh my gosh it's gorgeous well we can
reduce the canopy and try to prevent any you know that from happening and that break i'll authorize you to on that particular tree to reduce the canopy back to compensate for the damage to some of the roots got that
[Laughter] okay okay thank you thank you all right we've got several other things we got to talk about one is we're we're approved for Tree City USA we're now 43 years
frank I'm going to ask you to have your men put this up on this i got like I think we only have two signs one in West coming into West Main one coming in uh if you have your voice put those stickers on the on the Tree City
USA signs I I'd appreciate it hear that he's a All right street tree removal and trim oh let's get some of this other stuff out of the way first uh let's talk about uh Licate Electric Pruning we've had a
lot of complaints that's what I wanted to talk when when Bill comes back in because I wanted to ask him if he knows who exactly did okay the trimming but we could talk about it um there's a letter in this packet today i don't know if everybody has that um where the land the
person just me I'm the special one well anyway I called Atlantic City Electric because they had a different company doing the pruning and I spoke to Joe Gribbau Gribbau however you pronounce his name twice and um I'm concerned with some of the cuts
that they did on the trees they are and I gave the address of 1015 Washington Street he swears it wasn't his people that did it but a private contractor i don't know of any other private contractor that would have I was
out of town she did not get a private contractor what looked like dead branches fallen but she denied having so it had to be through Atlantic I mean the way that that tree is sounds like Mr
mayor council the mayor contract contact tree said that well I've noticed not just on that street but that that in particular 1015 Washington Street I mean they're not branches that were taken off usually you
see them now coming in they do directional pruning when the trees are younger so when they come now you're taking off branches that are maybe you know 4in caliber or whatever these are like boughs I mean they are huge that were taken off and they're just left to
be like 4 feet and then truncated stumps on these trees not only those trees but I've noticed on on um Jackson Street there was a sycamore there they not only did upward growing branches for some reason they did lateral growing branches
in a lot of cases and and a lot of cases lateral growing branches that were going toward the house or over the street which that's not their jurisdiction to do were coming out asking "Hey can you cut this?" Because again looking at this
looking at the pictures I Yeah there's the one right in front of the Merry Widow on Jackson Street and I mean I was I had that tree planted for that that condo association probably about 15 16 years ago it was beautiful i mean they took so many branches and they
were going laterally they weren't going some were going up into the wires but not all of them that they took off so what we're what I'm wondering is first of all do we have any idea how often they're going to be coming around like do we know are they going to come every year every two years every three
are we talking about Atlantic City Electric this is part of their resiliency program um it's really hard to say how often they're going to be doing this um I did speak to their government affairs rep this is before um
Ronnie went out on her leave she couldn't even tell me right so it's part of the resiliency program i would expect this to be done at least every What's What's that Frank three to two years every two years three to five
years yeah i I think that's probably more like it probably like three to five years but this is the first time that they didn't hire Aspen to come in and do it so a aspen Aspen and Lansancy Electric are no longer together all the people that work for Aspen is now with this new company
aspen usually I Aspen and Lance Electric no longer work together anymore he no longer works for him all the personnel that works with Aspen for Atlantic Electric now work with this new company Lewis yes well every other year I've called in at a gathering of these trucks
before they start in some bacon lot someplace and I give them not a pep talk but I just give them what we what we you know not to get too overly aggressive uh cutting these branches off these trees we know that they're hired to cut the
branches off the electric lines coming in to come so they don't have to come back for three to five years you know whatever they have to do and I give them a pep talk on not cutting it back so far we're going to get a lot of adverse calls well this year this new outfit
came in uh and they just went crazy and and I never got a call to give them a pep talk i I would have to say I asked for it yeah I would have to say Atlantic City Electric along with their rate hikes this I'm working on with them on a
project out in Village Green they really are nonresponsive on a lot of these issues um the best advice I could give is if you're very frustrated with it is to call Atlantic City Electric log your complaint call the BPU log your
complaint and make sure that it's on record on what your frustrations are that's what I had to do board of Public Utilities that's who manages Atlantic City Electric everyone has to answer to somebody so um I understand your frustration i understand this
commission's frustration just know that if you do have an issue you can certainly send it to Paul or myself and we would we'll try to get it to Atlantic City Electric but in years past they've been way more responsive on all of their issues and now it's I feel like they're
just kicking the can on a lot city manager it would probably have more weight if you called and said "We've getting we're getting a lot of complaints about the overaggressive trimming of some of these trees." I will certainly pass on the comments to the
government affairs team um but I think it's probably also strengthen numbers as well so if everyone on the commission wants to make that phone call as well that that would be important too but I will certainly pass on the uh comments of this commission yeah I have no
problem making that phone call like as I said I spoke to this person twice um about the prunings and and they assured me oh no these guys are trained and that the same people that worked for Aspen but I said one one of the things that I've that I noticed that this new
company is doing which is makes it look more aggressive is they're not only clearing the electric wires they're clearing the telephone wires which they never did that before they always cut below the electric wires and didn't care about the telephone wires now they seem
to be covering all of it which means they're cutting it back further than it had ever been cut back before well another tree that I want to make mention of that's also cut very similarly is the one on Lafayette and Madison on the Lafayette Street side of Burnite Agency
um that's cut the same way the branches that were going toward the house they're just chopped off not even in the lines when I spoke to this person it was an interesting uh an interesting conversation that I had in regard to trees because usually we hear from Atlantic City Electric about the
planting of large trees underneath wires and stuff so I said to him I said "I have a question because there's a home next to mine that has two large sycamore trees that are really up in the wires and stuff." Um and I said "They they've never been pruned from Atlantic City
Electric for over 20 years." And he did his Google Map thing and he said "Oh they're secondary wire so if the wire if the tree branches break it's only like six houses that are going to lose power." I said "Well mine would be one of them but okay." But anyway um I didn't realize that they don't do
anything with with secondary lines like that and he said to me I'm actually um the trees are better underneath secondary lines because they help keep the wires separated during storms so we like when there's trees involved it's news to me but anyway that
was another observation I I that I didn't hear before so anyway that's that's that person leans and touches against the tree jay I have a couple things I wanted to bring up is now the Let's talk about Let's talk about the street free removal
request forms uh we've had in Barbara's district we've had a little bit of a kufflele on uh 722 Corgi Street jay uh excuse me is it possible for me to speak right now to ask the commission to
listen to Barbara okay for her explanation of how this application progressed okay it was a very very difficult application and it upset and stressed me out so much i can't tell you
so much so that I had to actually contact Connie and ask her if she could put this on the agenda so that all of you could hear the story that was going on with this application because I was very very uncomfortable with it because
this man a very nice man I met him i was almost afraid to meet him because I he did so much research he just bought this house and he he had did so much research on his history that the application was like this long with all the pictures and the and he went through all the history
books and everything i went "Oh my goodness what am I going to face?" So I was afraid to really meet this man because I thought he was going to be really aggressive turns out he turned out to be a very very nice man and I worked the best I could with him but it
was so complicated because first of all all the trees he wanted to remove there were six pine trees on the side of the house there were two pine trees in the back of the house there was a weeping
cherry tree in the front of the house and then he was also interested in doing a 5050 with removing the street tree there was no way that I was going to do all of this on my own i needed somebody to to be there and take a look
and go go go forth with this so therefore I again contacted Oh by the way this all started in December of 2024 it was freezing cold we could hardly even walk out the door for me to
go over there and even look at this property i got snowed in my house for a week so I couldn't do all of this on my own so I went back to Connie and I said to her "Oh he kept coming to Connie the the owner of the house to say "When's somebody going to come over and take a
look at this when's somebody going to come over and take a look at this?" And as I just said I couldn't get over there at that point of time because I didn't want to go over there on my own by myself so I asked uh Connie if she would contact Jay and George if they could
come over with me and take a look because this man didn't want us to just go over there he wanted to meet with us so already I knew what I was going to be facing he was going to meet with us because he did all this history by the way he is in the uh roofing siding business and he wants to take all do all
this stuff to this house so that he can do a house rental so I'm facing all of this so I then I uh George wasn't available to to meet me it was okay George it was I was unaware of any of this until you've been in town i didn't even know about any of this until last week other thing everybody all of a
sudden is telling me this today in a couple of days they never knew about this i didn't know about it at all i kept contacting everybody not not everybody i contacted with Connie and I as I contacted That's what I did i contacted with you with with getting to and I thought you had me emails on that
and because I know Jay you did because I'm sorry George i didn't know that you weren't contact i was not aware yeah okay sorry about that anyway Jay did come with me and we went over to the house the property and we met with the
man kevin is his name jay you came over and you got out of your truck you walked on the sidewalk you didn't go in the yard you didn't go past any of the trees you went
on the sidewalk by the gate you looked at these trees and I was amazed but all of a sudden you said well the whatever the measurements and everything were we'll we'll take we'll we'll we'll say we can remove the trees that was your
and believe me this was my this was my district and I was just responsible for what I my decision was to be on things but you approved that we remove all of these pine trees and including the weeping cherry in the front of the house
now personally I thought the weeping cherry should be removed you did Oh I'm sorry i I take that back forgive me you You approved all the pine trees yes but you did not approve the weeping cherry in the front of the house or which the man explained the fact that it was not
really in that good of a shape and it also took away all of his view view of the back view of the back of the southern mansion i mean well it was his view of his house from his porch when he was going to have people sitting on the porch you know I have to say something
today we have to start discussing a more of this about these tree removals you know people I I I love all the trees and I I think we appreciate you know the beauty and joy of them but times have
changed there's a lot of lot of trees in this town now that are hund and some years old and they're starting to look it and I have I have to tell you I also want to tell you that I did I did email the mayor because he sent that letter to
the commission and he was very positively responsive to my email saying first of all that he thanked all of the commissioners for all the work they do he said it was a very difficult task at times but he was also complimentary for the fact that I explained like I am
today everything that happened with this application so getting back to where I was where I was before so I it was my district i had the I only wanted Jay and George to come over about these trees all these pine trees i didn't care about
so much about the approval of the weeping cherry because truth be told it was not a significant tree it was a It was a skinny little tiny little tree that's smack in the middle of his lawn how many of you have trees smack in the middle of your front porch
i do a lot i mean I have them on the side okay well everybody Well that's where I was going everybody when you're a property owner in Kate May we're trying to make Kate May look beautiful and people want to come here and stay with us so we have to be responsive
sometimes to some of our property owners where where they buy a new house or buy a house and they want to do things that they want to do not something somebody aundred years ago did now that's just my own personal opinion so I'm just sticking it in there anyway so getting
back to this tree removal so then as soon as Jay said that we we could remove those pine trees he left you you got back in your truck and you left and I stayed there with Kevin because Kevin really wanted to go
through all this stuff with me so we had to go out on the sidewalk and walk up to where the street tree was located and he started pointing out to me the sidewalk the roots and all of this all of this stuff going on and I personally we had
to discuss this 5050 sidewalk thing too because we were talking about that earlier this afternoon because a lot of times if why do a 5050 if and spend money when the roots are going to grow back and the the
sidewalk's going to crack again you know that's a difficult decision to make sometimes and Ryan was very good about saying what he thinks is good to do because at that point when I'm talking to this owner I say to him I have to discuss this with other
people in the commission about the street tree because I I don't know what to do because of it the 5050 thing and doing that and have removing the tree so I I think I
contacted I think I contacted Connie to get in touch with Ron so to have him go over there and take a look at this tree for removal or sidewalk or whatever which I did and
then I I talked to Ron oh no yeah he called me back after I contacted you Ron and No that's that's not exactly You said something about you needed I I received a I received a list of work to
do and one of them was to remove the tree and I went over right to mark it to get the mark out for it and I looked at it and I went you were 100% correct on that i'm telling you there was so much stuff going on with this application I'm
amazed I can even remember half of it myself right now okay but you did then contact me and say that you didn't think the tree should be removed and that you had a way that you could work with the tree and the roots and said the sidewalk could be curved in a foot foot and a
half and I agreed with you 100% i said "That's a great idea Ron." But I requested that if you could call the owner because I had already dealt with this owner and I knew where he had a positive attitude about where he wants to redo this house and so forth and so
on and he was not I didn't think he was going to take that lightly about the tree being removed so anyway I asked Ron to please call this the owner and I gave him I had the owner's number and I gave Ron the number to call i just found out
this afternoon when I came in here Rod never went never called him because he said that was not part of his job as a um city employee he's not on the commission or whatever so I get that is so that that's the end of this story this was the first time I heard this
today about the fact that he ended up removing that tree because the beginning of it all was when I put it on hold and said "We'll contact somebody because I'm trying to be as nice as I can." But this owner has a mind of his own and I think
I think he would have done anything anyway that's that was the impression I got i did my best to be as positive with him and come you know whatever to go along with the things he had oh by the way he did say when Jay was there that
he would re re he would reant the trees between the two properties he wanted magnolia trees on the side and I went into the back part of the house with him and he said he would put in some um oh I can't think of the names what are those the trees that are all coming
out now with the pink trees cherries cherry oh I can't magnolia i don't know cherries magnolia well he's putting magnolia crepe myrtle what is it crepe crepe myrtle yeah crepe myrtles he would put two crepe myrtles and so and while we were in the back there looking at
that he even got farther than that that's all he had to remove with the two pine trees in the back but instead he even said he would do uh crepe myrtles in the back and he then even wanted to do more shrubbery and asked my advice on what I would recommend for him to do because I told him I said you don't have
to do that you know that's your that's what you want to do no I want to do shrubbery so he he was a really positive guy he's very much interested he'd been coming to Kate Bay since he was a little boy and he was thrilled you know about having to get to do this house and
everything and he wanted as much advice from me and anybody else that could help him with the um with shade tree so that it basically that's where that's the end of my story except for the fact that as I said before I somehow or another um
Mayor Mullik got involved with this i don't even know where that came from but he was kind enough to email me back and thank me for my giving him what I've just told you today because he said he had gotten some other disinformation on things and so many people didn't know so
much that was going on like Ryan just said he didn't know about the um the the street tree removal exactly right from the beginning so I'm just saying to you I'm sorry that the that that tree got removed you know if Ron if we would have
been able if I had been informed that I had to talk to this owner and tell him we weren't going to remove the tree we were going to do what Ron wanted to do that never probably would although I don't know that that not would have happened because as I said before this man is very determined that he wants to
make this property his own and the way he envisions it he's going to do all new siding the roof you know I mean I got full detail and the first thing notice different on the thing is a rental sign went up on the ground yeah there is a rental sign on there so he's not going to he's not
going to live in it at least not for the foreseeable future well that brings us Well just a minute thank you all for listening to me i appreciate it well as sentimental and everything as this all sounds there's so many I said as sentimental and everything as that whole
story sounds that's what a lot of people are wanting to do when they come to Cape May i love the trees in the town i don't want them blocking my my house i'm going to put all this money into my house and I want people to see it and admire it that's too bad right then do not buy a
house in Kate May if you know that there's trees on the property look for a place somewhere else i'm not saying that we can't work with these residents and stuff like that but to lose that amount of trees and we now have a a lot in the center of the historic district that is
basically clear-cut is just really it stands out and the thing that is just comes across to me I knew nothing about any of this i don't know why this was never presented at a meeting and um for discussion since December but especially
where a street tree is involved we had that in place we have a protocol in place when it's a street tree that that should be looked at by every single commission member and I just reiterated that fact at last month's meeting and I don't understand how that was just
completely sidestepped i mean we really have dropped the ball with this one big time and so let's let's make it let's make it an agreement amongst ourselves anytime that there's a street tree a tree between the sidewalk and the
curbing or in one of the public parks or whatnot that we have jurisdiction in that has to be removed we discuss it here amongst ourselves and we get a majority vote i would read on that that was supposed to be set protocol for the
last several years that's been protocol for the last several years but I'm trying to reinfor members well two new members one's not here but uh uh well what I asked Connie to do was to come up with a with a sheet instead of having
one sheet for tree trimming and one street one sheet that includes trimming and removal having two separate applications if someone comes in and wants to remove a street tree that's one process if someone wants to have the tree in front of their property trimmed
that's a different process the one commissioner can say "Yes those branches look a little low or whatever and we can have the tree trimmed." But anytime it's a street tree I would like to see a different form being used where we would have to have as many commissioners as
possible and a majority sign off on it whether approved or denied and have it in concrete form not just verbally agreed upon because we have to have a paper trail we have to have um you know we need to have records of what's being
done with these street trees so I'd like to make a motion that we now have to have it in writing a written vote for approval or denial of removal of street trees i'll second it okay can you repeat it again George in
writing that it would have to we would have to sign off this a template like this something like that with the commissioner's name approval denied and sign off on it and I think the next step we're going to
have to do is whether this gentleman likes it or not is get street trees planted at that property yes I agree i think we should plant it make a make a Ron is there enough room in that is
there enough room in front of that property on Corgi Street uh to uh something like this to pl put another tree in there yes but it had to be moved over more towards the center of the property that that actually the tree that I took down probably 3/4 of
quarters of it was on 724 and only a little bit of it was on 722 so you have quite a distance between that and the driveway get it on the other side of the water line shouldn't it say street yeah we want to keep it away keep it away from the
lines so we get it away from that also but there is room on the property but there would be room you have to bust up some concrete though right not now right it's not really all that narrow you might be able to squeeze a small tree in there to let it start growing
all right let's let's make let's make plans to put another tree as soon as we can no right away don't approve it johnny what is this what is this new York Avenue that will be a different application that was because I was on
this between the curb and sidewalk because Jay if you wouldn't mind we kind of went over the city manager report i do have another meeting I have to go to okay so if you wouldn't mind I just wanted to bring to your attention that I believe
at the last meeting um city manager Dietrich provided some draft specs on a RFP or a bid that we're going to put out um for tree maintenance trimming etc so
I am passing out Frank's passing out the revised specs so we took your input paul was able to look at the um proposal sheet it's scheduled to be on the April 15th
um council meeting for uh approval of the specs and then we'll subsequently go out to bid shortly after that so I gave you the draft if you have any comments questions concerns you can email Paul myself or
Connie and she can get it over to us but it's scheduled to be on the April 15th meeting so agenda typically typically goes out the Friday before so if you have a question comment or concern try to get that as soon as possible if we don't hear anything that's going to be
the specs that are going to go out so this is you're going to submit for bids the stuff they have in already correct uh when is the the meeting the city the city has to make approval i mean they have to submit they have to make an
approval to submit to you know to solicit bids right correct and then so April 15th at that council meeting the it's scheduled to be on um for consideration to go out to bid after
that go out to bid when a uh it all depends on when it's going to get into the paper so I can't give you an exact date so April 15th it'll get on it'll be approved subsequently maybe a few days after that it'll go out into the paper
um our purchasing agent will put it out and then um probably about 30 days later for the accumulated the accumulated requests that he has so far is he going to put this under one contract or split it into several it's
one bid one bid so whoever gets this is going to have also and we would like let the city manager know that we would like an opportunity to meet to meet with the successful bidder absolutely to talk to him about arcing sidewalks and doing a
light hump up and over yeah uh and doing a cutout uh so they've been doing for 25 years so once the successful bidder is awarded that person if you see in the specs is required to
come to the commission meetings okay all right so you'll have your opportunity to meet with whoever that person is talk to them give them your questions comments concerns and we'll make sure that there's an open dialogue between the manager's office whoever the successful
contractor is along with the commission okay and this does not involve 50/50 city's going to pay for this whole thing right so this is this is a city bid okay all right so this isn't concrete this is
just for the tree removals pruning stuff like that this isn't this isn't sidewalks this bid that I'm showing you no nothing to do with sidewalks then what do we have to do with this that's the
That's the Can someone help me frank it it's a contract to haul call somebody to trim trees back that need to be trimmed or taken down that public works cannot handle it has nothing to do with sidewalks so if we have a tree limb that's needs to be taken down for
emergency operations and that public works cannot handle we have somebody on call 24/7 365 days a year hey we need this tree down now or put tree down or to trim back everybody's complaining about tree trimming in town needs to be done
maner can't always do it i can't always do it so forth so we're trying to hire a company out to bid that's going to handle all the tree trimming back as we are requesting thank you Frank nothing to do with sidewalks correct at all correct this
has strictly to do with the trees so that's where you guys come into play as the Shade Tree Commission we wanted to bring it to this commission first before we went out for any bid authorization we wanted to make sure that you had the
opportunity councilman Meyer um also wanted the full commission to to look at it so we're asking for your questions comments concerns we'll try to address them the best we can but it is scheduled for the April 15th council meeting to
approve those bid specifications for tree trimming removal etc not sidewalks so you don't have to give me a comment question concern now i just wanted to get it to you it's in draft form but that's game plan well let me
let me ask you a question then because if it's going to involve the street trees and it's a tree removal is this only for emergency situations is that what this would be used for cuz like we just this would be the contractor this would be for an emergency 10 years ago
every year I would do a bid process right uh and then all of a sudden 10 years ago they just stopped doing it for some reason i have no understanding why that they stopped doing it and this is just a bringing that back into play
correct this brings it into uh more of compliance of okay making sure that the city is doing their due diligence and listen Ron does an excellent job phenomenal phenomenal job
so this is really like Ron just said it's about making that process formal and it's not just emergency tree cutting it's pruning the trees back it's general maintenance on a tree okay thank you so any idea when the contractor is going
to go out to do the sidewalk i I don't have a report on that that's a little whiles away i know Paul is putting together um a bid to to do that so no report on that because under 5050 program we could have been working all
winter the sidewalks that could have been done all winter most of them have been done by now maybe yeah maybe so all of a sudden you're going to give this contract work to some multi- hopefully multi-state contractor is going to come in and and
do all this work in one or two years or something like that if that paul's working on a bid to go out shortly as the engineer all right all right thank you so whose district let's get to this well that's that's
what we just discussed that 1040 New York yes what we We just discussed that didn't we yeah that's what that is that was my district oh that's the one with the Malbury tree yes sir
oh okay i don't see any tree removal um applications or denials on this did we have any removals for this month we basically said no on this tree yes yes removals when we say approved denied
jay I have a couple items jay I have a couple items I wanted to bring up i want to talk about one other thing okay sure okay she's going to check into having the sidewalk redone around the Okay monumental tree lift oh that there's
going to be a tree replanted hello yes a monumental tree lift we've got a lot of big trees in Gate May some are on city property a lot of them are on private property i want each of you to go in your district and look for trees that
are 18 in or more 18 inches or more in diameter that's side to side measured four and a half feet above the ground that's mean chest height four and a half feet above the ground side to side is the diameter
okay 18 inches or more take a tape measure with you or a stick or something and submit a list of trees uh that in your district that are maybe consideration for monumental trees street trees or no they could even be
private property private there's going to be a lot of private property and we won't do private property notify what we want to do is notify owners then by property of that they have a significant it's not a monumental tree but a
significant tree on their property but how can you go into homeowners backyards to measure their trees well what we may need to do then in that case I see your point we may need to see you know observe one from a distance and then
have something Connie write a letter and send it to the homeowner and say "Poor Connie can we um grant access?" Do your best to identify it do your best to identify the type of tree it is that was 18 in in diameter leaves come out we
don't have to in diameter so 18 in in diameter I would say start at 18 in it could be bigger than that you'll know when you see the trees there a couple there's trees in each of your districts that are absolutely huge and many years ago considered a significant
or monumental tree many years ago we had a list of them we had a binder with all the um and they were called landmark trees at the time now a number of those trees are gone because we have no we have no beach trees left in the city the two large ones that were on Washington Street one fell in a storm the other one
was a product of construction uh it was removed because of that but we still do have a lot of monumental trees that we're now calling the monumental I guess um in fact it came to my attention because I had to take a look at a um a site on Cape Hart Street and there's a
huge elm tree in that backyard and I'm not sure exactly what the whole um construction I I think that's still in the works whatever is being done but I was I was just given that address to go and look at the trees that are on that property there's four large elm trees and the one is just really a huge huge
tree and from that property you can see there's also a significant sized ginko tree extremely large on uh Perry Street in the backyard of another property so that's what we're referring to those type of trees it doesn't necessarily also have to be that big jay if I just
want to put this out there on um Mount Vernon Street there's a snow fountain cherry and it's the largest one of its kind in the between first and second street on Mount Vernon and you almost have to walk underneath it yeah what kind of tree is it that's a snow
fountain cherry it's a weeping cherry i was I was a Japanese scholar tree no no japanese scholar tree is completely different they get to be a huge street tree that is that that's what is it a snow fountain cherry it's a Japanese
cherry a weeping cherry you know but it's the really uh it's unique so the uniqueness of it to here but this is certainly significant yeah well that's in your district so George we're identifying these to
what to we're going to Well that's what we have to come up with we have to figure out once we identify them how can we give them an extra layer of protection if possible well just notify the owners that they've got a significant tree on their property on their property but yeah but we you know
it's one thing to grant permission to take down a 30-year-old tree and a different thing to take down 150y old tree so that's something that we'll have to I mean maybe when Shane's at the next meeting he might be able to see how to present that to uh I don't know if we
can make that more of a thing all right that's all I have i have two things carol without the E has got a without the E and I go like that i can raise my arm she raised her arm real high now okay so um maybe we can
piggyback this on to looking at monumental trees i've noticed well several years ago we did an inventory of all our districts of street trees that had ivy on them mhm and I have noticed a bunch of street trees that seem to have
ivy back so maybe when we're looking at monumental trees in our district we could also catalog trees that have ivy on them so we could hand it over to public works and they could get the Yeah the That's something that you guys can do Frank right you can set a You can
send a request in but I cannot guarantee public works will have the time or manpower to do that at this time you what you can send a request in we will look at it but I cannot guarantee we have the time or the manpower to do that okay
so that's it's not something I want the it's not something I want the commissioners to have to do to take it you can if you want i've done it i've taken I've got a pair of shears in my truck uh I can't get around that much anymore with my knees being the shape
that they're in but take it and do it at ground level and then up two or three feet cut it there and just pull off those uh pull off those sections of ivy the ivy up top of the tree will die back it'll take it'll look like hell for one
or two years but uh but uh it'll I I recommend I recommend right now if you see ivy on a tree that you want it removed send a request in do not remove it because there's white there's a blue collar contract that will be involved with that okay you hear that we send
that in request gotcha okay she'll get them okay thank you Frank thanks Frank okay so I have another item um I have a request from the homeowners at uh 1201 Ohio Avenue it's the corner of Ohio and
Reading okay and it's a twin and the twin that's on the corner has been rebuilt and And we took a tree out we took a tree out on the driveway yes now they're asking for the street tree on
the right side of the driveway to be removed and we did a trimming of that too ron Ron trimmed that tree well they're still not happy with the tree and um they said you know they're happy to pay us
$300 to plant another tree and they would be happy to pay for the removal of the tree and um and this is a street tree this is a street tree it's not the most attractive looking street tree 1201 1201 Ohio ohio and it's on so I had Ron
take a look at it and as Ron said it's not the most attractive looking tree but it healthy enough it looks like it's going to leave not only did we prune it back from over the property but also the electric company came in and did their due diligence to it it isn't the
healthiest tree uh but I think it's a it's a silver maple okay they're very viligent as far as growing back uh they're resilient so my my opinion was to give it a couple
years keep an eye on it and see how well it grows back give it a chance yeah give it a chance so I was going to ask I mean Ron and I have looked at it but I thought because it is a street tree we should have everyone take a look at it and then come
back next you know I think that's Yeah we should and it's hard to get there because it's it's still under construction ohio is under construction but you can go down Virginia and turn the other way and and just hop out hopefully on a warmer day
but yeah we can do it soon all right thank you now since we brought up before about difference of opinion on trees even on private property that people are looking for removal if a removal what do what is our final thoughts are we going
to all take a look at those or have a majority of people look at those two tree removal on private property tree removal on private property should be evaluated by the tree commissioner for that history well my only concern what
if there's a difference of opinion i think that's what we want to I like reaching out to and get somebody else's We'd be here we'd be here i mean we're here i mean we're not here all day but we'd be here for more hours if we had to
look at every True every request for a tree removal to come in we got to have Well I understand it's not every request i think it's on private property if if there's a difference of opinion yes it could be right well we just told
the guy on Well let be let's put it this way let's be that's be up to the commissioner if the commissioner wants to bring in if the commissioner wants to bring in uh uh on a on a tree on private property that's up to him or her to bring it in before the commission but
normally it should be up to up to the commissioners to make those kind of decisions well street tree we've been burned once let's you know let's just make sure that we do street trees and removal we all have to agree on it right but on private property it should be up
to commission well it would help with a with another clear-cutting situation if we at least had two opinions that's my opinion what you know it would help with with a severe removal like we just had all that removed on Corgi i mean if we
had another extra person or two to look at it I think I agree that we're gonna have to have Now we did tell the person on uh Yeah that that we're going to look at that we're gonna look and that's because we had differences on Well I'm going to just give you the uh they wanted the they came back in for a
second opinion yeah that was an appeal appeal and I think we're going to have an appeal i think we're going to have an appeal on I don't know if we are but there's a I went to look at two trees at 20 Patterson Street one is a um crepe myrtle the other one is a maple a red
maple and there was a large bow removed from the from the maple um and they're saying it's rotted well the the where the bow was removed it's dead but it is starting to encapsulate the bark is starting to encapsulate and make a collar did they take the collar off or
move it up to the collar on a bottle like that you should remove it just up to that round collar where where Well it's starting to seal over but it's going to take a while but in any case I denied the removal so that's that's one thing that I just wanted to bring that up if anybody does want to look and give
their opinion on that it's 20 Patterson and the other thing that I brought up and this is not my district I think it's your district Barbara but I did go to look at it because it's a large tree it's 205 Howard Street now um I got your I did get your email and I'm I'm
thankful that you did send that to me because I was going to go over and take a look at it yeah it's a big tree i thought that it was like an old tree in good shape and it's not a street over the fence or something as far as it's very close to the property line which
Yeah so I denied it yeah I've sent Oh you denied yeah I've sent that to Connie not to re remove it okay but that tree there it does seem to have some issues and at first I thought it was an elm but now I'm thinking it may be a different species of um cottonwood of cottonwood
of popp yeah do you know which tree I'm talking about in the backyard so several times and uh I mean I'd hate to lose a tree that large but a lot of the bark is starting to come off and I don't know if
that's uh it's getting pretty close to the end of it life populars aren't a very long lived tree no but that tree is probably well over 60 years oh I would I would think the same thing i mean it's I'd hate to see
it come down yet but like I said that's not even my district but I think that's a tree that we should either No I appreciate your taking a look at that and Yeah sending that i mean if they do appeal it I mean I don't know well Ron you've worked on it before do you have an opinion on the health of that tree or
not you're just saying it's close to the end uh like I said it's getting towards the end of its life uh they they have had some damage to their property from the tree and the past we've had a lot of popper trees aren't a very strong No
they're soft yeah uh just fortunately it's allowed to grow up as big as it is because it's between two buildings uh but they have they actually just had damage last winter to their back porch okay from a limb coming off of it so
it's getting laggy and laggy i mean I guess we could wait and see how it leafs out but if it is you know that may be something we'll have to discuss at the next meeting i don't know um by then you should have your answer on what's leafed out yeah
okay all right those are But that's 205 Howard if anybody wants to see yes howard yeah and I don't think I have anything else in the backyard i had enough you can't okay spotted the lantern
spotted the lantern fly this is the uh this is the thing that's going to go out saw at the We saw that we saw it last month yeah yeah we had them last month Jay yeah the what we saw that the tree of heaven yeah this stuff is going to go
out with the water and sewer bills mhm all right does anybody have anything more for the good of the order no after a long and heated and detailed discussion I'll entertain a motion to adjourn i can make that motion also a
second carol your Thank you very much thank you very much for your patience thank you everybody