Street Roots • April 1 -7, 2016
Commentary
Page 11
Stumptown Fables
Debunking some myths about Portland’s new tree code
BY JIM LABBE
Jim Labbe grew up in Portland’s well-treed
neighborhoods where he enjoyed playing in his
tree fort high in the canopy of a bigleaf maple. He
served as Audubon Society of Portland’s urban
conservationist from 2002 to 2016 and on the
city-wide Tree Project Advisory Committee which
developed the city’s new tree code between 2008-
2010. In 2015, he also served on the Oversight
Advisory Committee that reviewed the first year of
Title 11 implementation.
CONTRIBUTING COLUMNIST
ince Portland’s new “City-Wide” tree
code (Title 11) went into effect last
year, myths and rumors abound about
its impact, its implementation and how to
improve it What follows are some of the
common myths and why they are not true.
S
Myth #1 Portland’s new tree code
weakened safeguards for trees. This rumor
circulated after it was revealed that a
developer could fell three massive sequoias
in Eastmoreland Neighborhood and pay only
$1,200 to plant two saplings to replace
them. How could that be? Some speculated
that Portland once had stronger safeguards
for trees in the past and that the City
Council’s action in adopting Title 11 made it
easier to cut trees. This certainly seems
plausible given recent events, but it is false.
Before Title 11 no tree regulations
applied to development or redevelopment of
individual properties, only in new
subdivisions, planned developments and in
environmental or scenic overlay zones. For
the first time, Title 11 required tree
mitigation and planting in conjunction with
thousands of building permits per year.
Hence, where rules require only $1,200 to
mitigate the removal of the massive
Eastmoreland qequoiasi,.t^^ ;old tree., code,,
categories that are currently the farthest
from achieving the city’s canopy cover
targets. They are also where more and
larger trees have the greatest potential to
reduce urban heat and improve air and
water quality and thereby yield improved
public health outcomes. High poverty, lower
canopy neighborhoods such as fully or
many parts East Portland have more
unimproved streets and more industrial
land. Hence the new tree code is weakest in
precisely the neighborhoods where the lack
of trees is a significant environmental justice
issue. For all these reasons the Title 11
OAC, the Urban Forestry Commission, and
Audubon Society of Portland have all
recommended removing exemptions for
commercial and industrial land as part of
future reforms.
would have required none at all. Title 11
also made tree cutting rules in
nondevelopment situations clearer and more
inconsistent. While far from perfect, Title 11
consolidated tree regulations and provided a
much more coherent framework that can
and should be reassessed, evaluated and
reformed over time.
That said, it is also evident that
Portland’s new tree code is a lot weaker
than Portlanders expected it would be. In
part, this is because the tree code was
developed between 2008 and 2011 during
the Great Recession. At that time few could
have anticipated the white-hot real estate
market we’re experiencing today. But it also
because the new tree code was not as
strong as it could and should have been.
Myth #2 Portland’s new tree code
requires developers to preserve trees. Read
Title 11 and you might think it requires tree
preservation. The code refers to a
“preservation standard” that appears to
require the preservation of one-third of
trees on a development site. However in fact
nothing in Title 11 requires that any tree
associated with new development to be
preserved. Developers who decide they
can’t or simply don’t want to preserve one-
third of the trees can pay a fee in lieu of
preservation to plant new trees on public
land. There are some tree preservation
requirements that apply specifically in
separate codes for development in
environmental zones, new subdivisions and
some planned developments (Title 33), but
these situations are a small and shrinking
percentage of all new development in
Portland.
The language in Title 11 that suggests a
“tree preservation” requirement where
PHOTO COURTESY OF JIM LABBE
The city approved the removal of these large healthy Douglas firs in the Powellhurst-Gilbert
Neighborhood in order to accommodate sidewalks and a parking lot for a new development.
Allowing tree-friendly sidewalk designs and/or waiving some off-street parking requirements
are just two reforms that could help preserve trees like these in the future.
there isn’t any, is one of the most confusing
and frustrating aspects of the new code for
ordinary Portlanders. However, legally, there
is nothing to prevent the City Council from
establishing a real Title 11 tree preservation
requirement. The Title 11 Oversight
Advisory Committee (OAC), the Urban
Forestry Commission, and Southeast Uplift
have already proposed the city develop a
site review process for some large healthy
trees that would require developers to
demonstrate the need to remove trees to
meet desired density before permitting
removal. This approach would be entirely
consistent with the stated purpose of Title
11: Preserve trees that can be preserved
with new’development.
Myth #3 Portland’s new tree code
applies equitably citywide. Portland’s new
tree code was born from the “City-Wide
Tree Project” which heeded calls for reform
in neighborhoods across the entire City.
Between 2008 and 2011 the project staff
and stakeholders worked to develop a
“consistent, cohesive and comprehensive”
regulatory framework for all types of trees
across all types of land uses. But a pending
lawsuit related to industrial land supply and
some eleventh-hour lobbying by developers
and real estate interests during the
legislative process successfully exempted
most commercial and industrial sites from
new tree regulations. After the code went
into affect last year, internal lobbying by the
Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT)
successful narrowed the city forester’s
discretion with the effect of lowering the
maximum tree mitigation that could be
applied with public right-of-way
improvements (See Myth #8).
Such exceptions and exemptions make for
inequitable outcomes for Portlanders and
undermine efforts to foster a healthy urban
forest city-wide. Industrial lands and the
public right-of-way are the two land-use
Myth #4 Preserving more trees in
•
PorflandiA^*18í%e:%!^ñ^f¥^Mtífehfitoa3Prnii
growth boundary aña thféatéñ f¿fésl áñd' r r
farmland preservation. This argument is an
old favorite of those who see a political
opportunity in pitting urban tree advocates
against advocates for forest and farmland
preservation and walkable neighborhoods.
The variant on this myth is that a “tight”
UGB and regional density goals threaten
urban trees by constraining land supply and
forcing conflict with development.
For several reasons, both variants pose a
false choice. First, both Title 11 and zoning
code changes adopted in 2011 were
intended to improve tree preservation and
tree planting while allowing development to
meet zoned densities. As noted above, the
code clearly was not intended to preserve all
trees on development sites but merely
encourage (but ultimately not require) more
tree-friendly design in meeting zoning.
More importantly, housing capacity in
Portland is more than sufficient to support
both tree canopy and housing goals. Even if
the city required developers to preserve
more healthy, non-nuisance, non-hazard
trees, it needn’t limit density in most
situations. But even if it did, the space to
preserve more large healthy trees would be
a drop in the bucket in terms of the overall
land supply and zoned capacity, especially
on the regional scale. Consider the fact that
the Metro Council has added more than
31,000 acres to the UGB since 1979 but
only 6 percent has been developed.
Consequently there is currently room for
40,000 new single family homes inside the
current UGB, plenty of room to have new
development and large healthy trees in our
neighborhoods.
See STUMPTOWN, page 13