City Council - Regular Meeting

United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

All right. Thank you and welcome everybody. It's good to see a full house. It's always good on a Monday. Monday night. Here we go. So, first thing on on the agenda is public comment. So, if there's anybody has any public comment this evening, hearing any, not hearing any, not seeing any, we're going to go ahead and move on. So, first we got the Hampton tree board with us this evening, but I think it's the entire tree board, but I don't know who's gonna is Ned gonna talk or Dick, you gonna get it started? Because she's always there taking pictures. So, okay.

And Ned's going to join me up here. Ned Parker with the conservation. All right. Perfect. Um, and these guys are all treeboard related, tree tree related, a lot of dirty fingers, a lot of hard work. These guys have planted hundreds and hundreds of trees around town.

It started 13 years ago, initiated this tree board, and about 11 years ago, we started a program. Well, there was actually an ordinance change that allowed uh planting or replanting of trees in the in the rightways along the streets and we replaced a lot of trees already, but we were fortunate enough this year to get a grant from the DNR, sizable grant that's going to help us plant a lot more. Let Ned talk about that and then I'll talk talk to you a little bit about the plans for the cemetery for this year. Okay. Okay. Um, and so, yeah, my name is Ned Parker. I'm the county conservation director also on the Hampton Tree board. So, wearing a couple hats, I suppose. Um, the Friends group has been approved for a grant for $22,000 from the Iowa DNR uh through 2027. So, it's 2026 and 2027 specifically for trees and then tree tubes, uh, fencing stuff for trees. Um, so we are estimating that'd be about 140 trees to be planted and that just needs to be planted on public property within the county. So it could be within the city of Hampton, could be within the county parks, stuff like that. But one of the things that we had in our proposal is that we'd like to add some more trees in the parkway, so between the sidewalk and the street. Um, and so that's the the materials you have in front of you is this is just a very rough draft but of something that we could give to a land owner or homeowner. Um, but essentially we would like the homeowner to request a tree or they they basically need to want a tree. We're not going to go plant trees in front of people's homes if they don't want them. And so the idea behind this letter is um we give this out to folks and if they don't want a tree, they need to let us know. Otherwise, if they don't respond,

then they'd be getting a tree. Um again, that's up to you guys how you'd like us to handle that. If we can we mail these out, if we put them on people's doors, whatever. Um, but what you have on that map there is those are idea areas in town that we've identified that they're open spots where there's no trees and it doesn't account for underground utilities or anything like that. So there are more spots identified than we would have trees to plant. So this is just a starting point basically and that our plan would be is we would go around with the public works staff and identify and do one calls for all of these and identify obviously if these are areas where there's underground utilities we can't plant here you know maybe we can plant on the other side of the street or somewhere else. Um and so that's I guess kind of the idea in a nutshell. Um the list of trees. Yeah, you guys got the list of tree species here that are approved uh by the DNR and also from the Hampton list.

Did you guys have anything else to add? Uh we'd be planning to plant um about 70 trees this spring. Is that correct? Up to 70 trees this spring um in this general area. And also if people are interested, they can just reach out. We'll have Ry's phone number on there. Um, even if you're not identified in one of these areas, you could still potentially receive a tree. Again, the tree is going to be free, no cost to the homeowner. It's 100% grant covered and planted by volunteers. So, the only thing that we're going to ask is that the homeowners help with watering the tree in their own rightway in front of their house.

Sizes of trees, but generally, if you think of a red ball, that's um If you think of a rip ball, it's about the size of a 5gallon bucket. A little bit bigger than that. That be the normal size. Some might be a little bit bigger than that, but they'll be four feet to some of them be 7 feet tall. Yes, Mr. Lo. Oh, I was just wondering if you're going to hand something like this out to the private citizens. Maybe there should be something on there about calling for locates if they're going to do it themselves. We'll take care of all the locates. Okay. So that way we make sure that they're done at the time that they need to be. Okay.

Yep. Thank you. Um but otherwise I'm more or less just looking for guidance and your consideration if you think this is a good plan that we should go forward with it. If not, we can pivot and plant these trees elsewhere. So um we just kind of are looking for guidance and then once we get the okay, then we're going to get approval from the DNR and we can order the trees. So, so you're looking for an opt out, not an opt in. That's the way it's worded. So, this is I think I might have said this earlier. I took this from the city of Ames. This is what they use. Okay.

And so, you're correct. It's an opt out. We can change that if the council would like to. It's sometimes difficult for people to return stuff if they get it. They don't like to call people or what have you. So, that's why we added it as an opt out. We could change it to an optin. Um, but anyway, that's why I had it as mapped out.

I think the there's there's a lot of trees did come out of the out of the parkings, you know. So, I mean, it's I think it's a great program and and especially to get a grant that large uh to plant trees. Um, I guess they would say on your map, you know, if you're going to identify where they were going to go and reach out to homeowners or are we just going to some kind of a mailing or something so that everybody gets this. So, they do have the option to op out opt out if they want to. Yes, everybody that would be identified in this map would receive this. And that's okay. We didn't know if we should be mailing these out or if we can put them on their doors. I don't know the proper channel to do that, but anyway, whatever the proper channel is, everyone will be receiving a letter like this.

Okay. In regard to that, we already have a dozen people who have contacted us because they they've heard that we're going to be doing this program. So, we're one sixth of the way there already. So, whatever you guys decide, we'll do a lot of be talking be doing a lot of talking to people one one-on-one. So, I don't know if a mass mailing is necessary or not, right? I'm not convinced that that would be the case, but if you wanted to do that, we could do that. Yeah. I I think it just if we want to make sure everybody's aware of it one way, I don't have any thoughts on you guys. I I think a man's mass mailing would work, but

or put stuff at the library or the post office or Facebook page or Yeah, there's a lot of places to do that. Yeah. Yeah. Could you uh pick a few spots at the new NYAK center or the compost site for trees? We certainly can look at that. That would qualify. Mhm. Thank you. Yeah, because we'll have, like I said, this is only half of the trees, so we're going to get 140. So, obviously, we're trying to space it out and not do 140 trees all in 2026. But, u Yeah, absolutely. There's spots there.

I have a question, more of a general question. could be for the tree board or for the city. You know, we've had a number of trees taken out, ash trees taken out on the various uh properties. Do you know if like quite a few or all have had replacement trees planted and if not, they would be I think ideal to be contacted to plant trees again replacing what had been taken out. We've actually replaced quite a few of those trees over the last three years or four years since the ash ashbor was located in Hampton. And some of those 12 people that we're talking about, they are some of those those people who've lost a tree already.

So, we're very aware and want to do that, but we will operate on a first come first- serve basis. Okay. Right. Good. Thank you. I have a question. Go ahead. Um I see you have one plan for East Park. Um, that was the memorial tree. One memorial tree by the house for the grant. That's not from the grant. Pardon me. That That's not from the grant dollars. That's uh someone had donated money for a memorial tree, I believe. I apologize if it's on this list here. I just know that there's been a conflict with the trees in the East Park and I just wanted to make sure we were okay. What kind? What conflict? They were unhappy with the number of trees in the park. Am I talking about the right word?

That was memorial. Memorial Park. That's where I've been in Memorial Park. Never mind. Never mind. I had just one question. Yep. We had quite a few trees that were taken out along the walking trail from the cemetery location that heads east towards Windsor Circle. Were you planning to replace those trees with some of these? That would be a certainly a great spot to do it. Yes. I've heard a lot of comments about the wind that's coming through there now. Yes. from the walkers because the trees they were mostly ash trees unfortunately. Yeah, they they they needed to go but yes, but that would be a great spot. Yes. Great. Thank you.

And we just had uh I believe Doug could confirm we took 44 trees out of the cemetery this winter and there probably another 30 to go. Yeah.

Just one thing for everybody. All those spots where trees are supposed to be planted are There are no overhead wires in any of those locations. That was all researched ahead of time. So, and everything we're planning is going to be a full size tree to get shade later on. Possibly smaller trees if we have a wire overhead wire issue. We're concentrating on shade trees back 365 ash trees and trees were taken out right away in Hampton alone. The That's a lot of shade.

That's a lot of trees. And that affects how the storms come through the town. Now, the storms are taking out other trees because all these big trees that were protecting them are now gone. Makes a huge difference. And now we're discovering bad spots in other trees that we thought were okay but had a bad spot in them. And now they're succumbing to storm need to plant. Any more questions about the the program? If not, I'll go on to describe the plans we have for cemetery trees. All right. I think you guys should have maybe on the back page. Oh, the total plan for the cemetery would be 17 trees. Of those, six of them are memorial trees and they're e xed in a circle around them. You'll see. And those are trees that are paid for by um descent uh by well in memory of family member, friend, whatever. Um there's one tree that's straight south of the office uh the cemetery office and that's the tree that's going to be planted in in honor of our 250 our nation's 250th birthday. And then there are 10 replacement trees of we're replacing 10 of the 44 trees that we've lost. And those I think I got just a single X, not the X with the T.

And those trees, if you came in the south south se cemetery gate, there are two rows of mature trees right now. The north row has seven trees. The south row has six trees. And actually, two of those 13 trees are in bad enough shape that they need to go also. So the planting of seven of the 10 replacement trees will all be east and in intermixed in the same line lines that are there. So we're leaving space open. If cemetery board decides that they want to have the columbarium on the west end of that area, it'll be left open and be left open for parking too or whatever. So you mentioned East Park. Thank you. We are going to have we've got a request for a memorial tree in East Park. So that's going to another memorial tree and I think unless you guys have any questions. Um what we would be asking you to you guys to do would be provide the funds for those 10 replacement trees for the trees that ash trees and other trees that had to be taken out. Otherwise all the funding would be coming from from us and this grant money probably about I'm going to say the cost of those replacement trees going to be probably average about $65 a tree including the fencing that needs to go around them. We miss anything guys?

Anybody any discussion around the cemetery trees? Any concerns? I don't see any. Okay. Well, we're feeling very blessed as a we should be feeling very very blessed as a community to have received $150,000 for maintenance and repair of trees from the Bruce Dorman Foundation. So, we're very fortunate in that respect, too. Thanks, guys. Thanks for all your work. Thank you. Thank you.

You guys do a lot of work out there. I know I know Randy keeps trying to get me out there to help plant and I just I'm so busy for the picture. Yeah, I'll get out there again this year with you guys. I will do that.

All right. Appreciate you guys coming in and and sharing your plan with us because that that goes a long ways. We got we got people wanting trees, want people noting them, and we just want to make sure we get them in the right spot. Awesome. That helps us out a lot. All right. Again, pretty Thank you. Okay. Next item. We got to go into close session, so we're going to kick everybody out. But thank you guys. Short enough for you? Yes. So,