The New Castle City’s Tree Commission Meeting took place on September 19, 2005 at
5:30 p.m. in the City of New Castle’s Town Hall.
Members Present: Chip Patterson, Chairman
Erv Thatcher
Susan Keyser
Mark Miller
Members Absent: Chandler Gebhart
Lillian Shue
Fran Peden
Matt White
The meeting was called to order at 5:35 p.m. by Chairman Patterson.
Report of Commission Members
Irv Thatcher – On 9th Street there is a small maple tree that has a lot of dead stuff in it. The elm tree at 3rd and Chestnut Street has one big branch sticking out over the street. He feels it should be trimmed.
Susan Keyser – The ash trees need treatment and we have a preliminary list that we used to treat ash trees earlier in the year. He (Bartlett) could work off that list plus any additional ash trees we note. A tree at 702 Tremont Street will be added. There is a time window involved. Treatment on both elm and ash trees should be done while the trees have liquid moving actively through their system, which is prior to fall. They had been treating for bores; this is for the fungus that caused trees to drop their leaves. He can’t give me an exact price on ash trees until I give him an exact list and he measures them. She estimated the cost to be several thousand dollars. We have a price for the elm trees. Two trees, one at 310 Chestnut Street and the one on The Strand no longer need to be on the list. We need to make sure there are no trees on The Green that need treatment. Mr. Miller made a motion to spend up to $3,910 to have the elm trees treated, with the price being adjusted to reflect removal of the tree on The Strand and the tree at 310 Chestnut Street. Ms. Keyser seconded the motion, which was approved unanimously.
Ms. Keyser will get a price on the ash tree treatment. Mr. Thatcher suggested getting the trees done before next month. The Chair made a motion to allow expenditures up to $3,000 for ash tree treatment. Ms. Keyser seconded the motion, which was passed unanimously.
Ms. Keyser added that our weather is favorable right now and that the work can likely be done in the next two weeks before the end of September.
Tree Planting -- She is developing a list for tree planting and will add Mr. Miller to the list.
Ms. Keyser would like to do maintenance to existing trees. The Chair informed we have approximately $22,000 at this time. She will contact Matt White about his assisting with this work. She suggested Commission members put together a list of trees that need to be shaped up. Mr. Miller asked if a specialist could look around town and inspect trees. The Chair said he was sure this could be done. (Names of qualified persons were briefly discussed.) The Chair will speak with Bob Sloan about this matter and report back at the next meeting.
933 Gray Street – Ms. Keyser spent some time with Gary Rullo in June about whether it is possible to fix the sidewalk and keep the tree at this property. The Chair said that
New Castle City Tree Commission Meeting
September 19, 2005
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Russ Carlson informed him the root could not be touched. If it was disturbed we would lose the tree. This house is for sale. The homeowner got a contractor involved to discuss putting in a sidewalk. Ms. Keyser said a worker informed her a structurally-sound sidewalk could be put in, but narrowed to 28 inches in one location to accommodate the tree. This worker would check with the City (Jeff Bergstrom) office about the situation and whether he could get a permit to put a sidewalk in with those parameters. He has informed Ms. Keyser that
Mr. Bergstrom states he can’t build a sidewalk that narrow because of ADA-type concerns. (Discussion about the sidewalk width and possible solutions took place.) Ms. Keyser would like to ask the owners to put a tree back in and make sure it is the minimum we are trying to do, like 16 square feet. Ms. Keyser made a motion to have the tree removed and grind the stump with the stipulation that we ask them to put in a tree base at a minimum of 16 square feet any place they want in front of their property and $350 towards replanting of that tree. Mr. Miller seconded the motion. The motion passed unanimously. Ms. Keyser will make contact with the agent tonight.
Tree Ordinance – Ms. Keyser wants to remove the entire section detailing “nuisance trees” and replace it with “street trees shall not be removed unless determined by the Tree Commission on the basis of a true report prepared by a certified arborist for the applicant and other relevant information that the tree should be removed because it is dead, dying or is a hazard.” The Chair wrote a letter to Council President Bill Blest informing him that we need resolution on the issue of jurisdiction over street trees. For us to address the ordinance in its final format we need to know whether we do or don’t have jurisdiction over all the trees in the public right-of-way. He has not received a response although Mr. Blest has asked if we will have an ordinance this month. I have emphasized to him we need a legal opinion on this. The City has a new City Solicitor, Gerry Kavanaugh. Mr. Kavanaugh has asked for all papers from former City Solicitor Cliff Hearn. A lot of City matters he dealt with when he was with the City before were with the original tree ordinance. He wants to review his notes before making an opinion. Mr. Miller suggested asking Mr. Kavanaugh to prioritize this so we can get this done. Ms. Keyser also feels that the ordinance separates the Tree Commission as an advisory group and gives all authority and power to the forester. When this was rewritten we meshed the two together and any place where the forester had more authority than the Tree Commission we tried to shift it back to the Tree Commission.
New Business
Mr. Miller again expressed concern with the number of young trees that have either died or look bad. Two Linden trees in the park past the mile marker have either died or have a problem. He reemphasized we be very careful when we select to plant trees because some of them are bad from the beginning. Ms. Keyser said she spoke with Sally Monigle about how much trouble we have had planting and she said that when she was on the Tree Commission sometimes they would call Bartlett and have them do it. It is very expensive. Mr. Miller said Bartlett made a real effort to have us adopt them as our tree contractor some years ago. They do very high quality work, but are very expensive.
New Castle City Tree Commission Meeting
September 19, 2005
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Adjournment – Mr. Miller made a motion to adjourn the meeting. Mr. Thatcher seconded the meeting. The meeting was adjourned at 6:20 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Debbie Turner
Stenographer
