City Council - workshop

just say, give your name, how long you've been in your position. And for fun, I know that other organizations have done this, so I'm borrowing it, is what is your favorite summer food? So you get to start.

Well, my name is Bruce White, and I've been in my position since January. My favorite summer food is grilled steak, medium well.

OK. You want to go that way? I'll go last.

So I'm Terry Mounts. I've been in my position since January, and I'm going to steal his favorite food, and I'm going to say pretty much anything I don't have to cook. Steak.

Susan Johnson, Parks Board and Planning. I'd like anything to eat in the summer.

Trina Ternes, I've been on the council since January. My favorite summer food is rainier cherries.

I'm Jason Roberts, council member since January, and favorite food is embutido. Embutido is the Spanish dried meats.

I'm Mikayla Zorro. I've been on planning commission for just over two years, and I have a pear tree in my yard that is almost ripe, so pears are my favorite summer food.

I am Jill McNally Martinez. I've been on council for about a whole month now. And I think my favorite summer food is just anything icy to drink.

Hi, I'm Bruce. And you can't get much greener than me.

I think in three months I've been on planning commission.

And my favorite summer food, the good old American hamburger and French fries.

Jackie Strader. I've been on the Planning Commission for three months, and mine would be raspberries and Miriam berries. Any summer berry.

Oh, yeah. John Porte. I like street tacos, carnitas, or al pastor.

Jacqueline Whalen, serving on the Milton Planning Commission since January 2002. Favourite summer food would be peaches right off the tree when they're ripe.

Hi, Tim Cedar. I've been on Council since 2021 and I like an ice-cold watermelon.

I'm Anangely Stelnicker, been here just, it'll be five years in August, and my mom's apple pie. So just a quick kind of how we're, like I said, we're going to try to, I tried to kind of put out an outline to kind of give us a feel of where to go through, some time points. Part of this being that this is might be a very large topic and we all have to be careful how much we speak so that we all get a turn. There's quite a few of us here. So hopefully we will have, I was trying to save the most time for what I think is some of the biggest issues out of this or the biggest areas of discussion and then zipping by some stuff that is probably not as big a deal. So... We will just kind of zip, I just wanted to give a real quick five-minute background of where, of the Planning Commission and where this work came from. So the Planning Commission itself is a seven appointed residents. They're appointed by the mayor, approved by the council, rotating six-month, or sorry, six-year terms. They are, it's in most cases a requirement under the RCWs have sort of this advisory group that looks at zoning subdivision and environmental codes, doing the study for it, working for the council, holding public hearings and such. Those topics are set by, we provide a work plan to council usually in December or January, and then as other areas of priorities come along. And then I wanted to point out, so this is directly from our 2044 meeting, You adopt in 2024 with a 20-year plan, so that's why it's 44, vision of the comprehensive plan. And so number six of that vision is to retain and enhance tree canopy and other environmental amenities. So it starts right in the comp plan, which is that vision for the entire city like I said, for hopefully what we're able to do in 20 years. That is then drilled down into land use goal. Under land use goal five, land use policy 5.3, is to maintain and strategically expand the city's urban tree canopy so that it equitably reduces the impact of urban heat island effects.

Can you repeat that?

Yep, maintain and strategically expand the city's urban tree canopy so that it equitably reduces the impact of urban heat island effects. I do have a few paper copies, if that would help anyone. Oh, look at you. And then there was some conversation about like city property. And while this particular proposed ordinance does not address city owned property, the city does under the parks and rec goal have similar direction that we are to mitigate impacts of the urban environment through the preservation of large trees, use of rain gardens, low impact storm mitigation strategies, and other sustainable design strategies where appropriate. So those are built into ours as well. And where they aren't, we will be increasing those over the next couple of years. And then we did public engagement. So obviously again, backing up to just the comprehensive vision and goals, those were public meetings in 22, 23, 24, meeting with the public, getting a feel of what that vision is for the city. Obviously after some of our big projects, the church and the apartments, And we've got some private properties where developers are redeveloping areas in the single family. Staff has gotten numerous phone calls. I know people have come to council meetings. I've been interviewed by the, I think, three TV stations dealing with trees. So it has been sort of this hot topic of wanting to, feeling from our perspective that you're wanting to address not losing all of our large trees. LAST YEAR FOR MILTON DAYS IT WAS OUR FOCUS, WE HAD A TREE, WE ENGAGED WITH INDIVIDUALS ASKING THEM TO WRITE ON THE LEAF WHAT WAS, YOU KNOW, WHAT THEY VALUED FOR TREES. Oh, I apologize, I should have had the number. We had quite a few people that supported it, who put it, and those things that hit are those things that are really important. Clean air, beautification, shade, food, wildlife, ecosystem, and funded climb, which that's no longer something I can do, but that actually I think had three responses. And then obviously the Planning Commission and the City Council held specific public meetings. Come on, there we go. And then just again, the Planning Commission itself met on the 8th, the 10th, and then in March twice, and then again in April, trying to come up with something that, working on this urban forest code. And so this is where we were gonna have Ben Thompson give us sort of some background of the value of trees, why he's specifically urban and community forestry, why that's important and different things. He is stuck in traffic. He's probably said at this point, maybe 15 minutes behind. So we're just gonna kind of keep moving forward. And a little cartwheel for the horse, but that's okay. When he gets there, we'll just sort of back up and let him do his thing. And then he was going to stay through the whole thing. So if there's questions that we want, that we feel like he might be useful, we can ask that as well. So as we go into... I want to take, and I've, the Planning Commission designated Planning Commissioner Whalen to just sort of give just a brief overview of what the planning, kind of their guiding structure, what they were focused on when they came up with this ordinance. And so I'm gonna let her just share a little bit of what that was.

So I'm putting myself on a timer here and looking to be brief to just jump in and say our current situation, we're all here to make Milton better. It's a subjective view. We've all got different approaches based on our backgrounds in life and what we've learned as we've grown. And we need to make the benefits the trees provide available to us. They're scientifically proven. They've been listed already. We have a development circumstance right now where development allows for three dwelling units on one single family lot now. Guess where, and our city regulations I should say, exempt more than half of the city of Milton by simply saying the rules that were in place right now, single family lots are exempted. Single family lots represent at least actually more than half of the city of Milton. Guess where all the development pressures happen? It's happening in what we used to call the single family zone. Guess where the majority of the trees are? In the area that we don't have regulations protecting. I hope that gives you a sense of the sense of urgency that the planning commission felt on the need to develop a set of rules that were fair. We all share in the benefits of the trees. We all have a responsibility to make Milton not only a better place for people, but a better place for trees. What we struggled to do those first few months was try to come up with a program. It was tough. We started looking around for other frameworks. We found the city of Burians to be balanced, middle of the road, recently put into action about five years ago, recently updated about three years ago. two, three years ago. The city is five times the size of Milton, so they've had lots of practice using their code. And it's middle of the road. You start doing research and realizing a comprehensive program is where more and more cities are moving to protect trees. So in terms of The fact that there's things that could be improved, the Planning Commission saw this as let's get this on the books as soon as possible. As was said earlier, every tree has a benefit. Losing that tree, we can't retrieve that loss. It's like you have $1,000 in your bank account, you pull out 900, it's gone. The interest growth, all the benefits you get from that. So we had a sense of urgency about it, and we recognized we'd be working to make it better. And it's the start of a much bigger program with more opportunities for improving the code, building coalitions, and building a stronger, healthier urban forest. I don't want to use much more time. I hope that's helpful. Thank you.

So basically, the format that I've got is, as it says here, is kind of, I was just going to kind of go through the purpose, and then we'll start in on the, I tried to kind of organize it by the type of lot that it's affecting, because I think, you know, there's little bits in each section that affect different lots, and I felt like that was the most easiest to deal with. So...

Yeah.

Yes. The purpose of this section is to implement the comprehensive plan. Again, which is minimum standards for maintaining and expanding the city's urban forest, increase canopy coverage in an equitable manner across Milton, enhance the quality of life, protect and enhance property values, promote retention, protection of vegetation, reduce impacts on drainage systems, natural habitat, absorb wind and noise, enhance air quality, conserve valuable water resources, increase privacy, and to foster a healthy and attractive community. And then we list like a whole bunch of more specific items with that. So that was sort of, again, incorporating all those things that we felt that the comp plan fills that trees can do. So at this point, the first kind of, which I think is the easier one, is how this affects vacant property. So I'll just sort of quickly go through this, and then my feeling is to open it up to if there's questions or discussion between, and I'll let Bruce sort of, between him and I, we'll figure out how to give people permission. Exceptional trees, so on vacant property, so there's nothing on it, you cannot remove an exceptional tree unless it's determined hazardous or an emergency. replacement trees will be required if removing that tree drops you below credit amount. Significant trees are no removal unless determined they're hazardous or emergency or they're on a prohibited tree list. And again, you have to replace if it drops you below a credit amount. you would be required a minor permit. I know council asked like, what would that possibly cost? The fence one we do is 75, which is comparable to half an hour work. I think in most cases, unless it's something that for some reason, if they're just asking for one tree, I think that's reasonable. It may have to have a thing that says, if you're asking to remove multiple trees and we have to do a longer study or bring in an expert, there might be a way that we'd have to recoup those costs. One of the things we do in Planning Commission is we sort of do a quick, is there any technical questions that somebody has? And then we do sort of is there, and then open it up for more discussion questions.

What's considered vacant property? Just like if somebody has two acres and one acre of it versus their house is only one acre? What is this?

If you own two parcels.

So it's by parcel, by tax parcel?

Yeah, so if, yes. So if you, there are people who have a house and they, it feels like it's all one lot, but there's technically two tax parcels, we would... I would treat them as separate parcels. So one would be developed and one would be vacant.

And is that established in the plan of what a vacant is? Is it by tax parcel?

We could clarify that if that was something. Like I said, that's how I would interpret it. But if we felt like that was something squishy, happy to clarify that.

I know that there's two on just the lot where I grew up. But all in all, though, I mean, how many vacant lots are there in Milton?

Make sure when you talk, you're speaking into the mic because it doesn't pick up otherwise.

I was just curious about the number.

Sorry.

I was just curious about the number of vacant lots. Do we have a count for that?

We probably do in the lot. We do every 10 years or eight years. We do a survey. I'd have to look, but we probably have that count somewhere. Is there any other questions?

It's not a question but a comment to what you already added regarding multiple tree removal for the pricing of it. I think we should definitely, you know, be specific with that if there's more than one tree to be removed for the amount of cost for the work.

Yeah, so this is just a suggestion because it would come on the fee schedule that will come to council if when we, and it would say a MITRE permit is this. What it would probably, my anticipation is the permit would be $75 and then we have language that says plus any, you know, if we have to have an outside consultant or anything like that, they pay, I think it's the cost plus 10% or 5% or something, so.

So we have an outside consultant or an on-call contract already for permits, the one that we were talking about last week. They would be looking at something like this, that contractor?

No. So the permit itself would be done in-house. But if, let's say, so let's say they have a hazardous tree and they have to provide us a permit or, sorry, a report. And if we felt like Again, if it was a single report and we felt like we could interpret that ourselves, we would just do that for the $75. If it's somebody coming in and they're saying they have four or five trees and it's a little questionable, we will, and we do not have an official on-call arborist that meets the qualifications, but that would be part of it, that we would need to get an on-call arborist that then we could call upon in those situations And we would, in that case, since we don't have one, I don't think we have anybody official. I know Public Works has used people on occasion, but we would go out for request for qualifications for that. And that way we would have an on-call arborist for whether it was something small like this, or if we were doing a bigger project, and again, we felt like we needed more expertise, then those costs are usually passed through.

So we don't know how much it would cost the city to pay for an on-call arborist to establish another contract. And we don't know how much it would cost the private property owners That would be determined, yes.

So there would be a cost to the city and a cost to? There would be no cost to the city.

Well, for the contract, there would be a cost to the city. You would recoup it, but initially, the city would have to go out for RFP and higher costs.

Yes, there would be the cost for an RFQ, yes.

Yes.

Just to clarify. It would be the arborist that would actually make the determination that is hazardous or an emergency and that would need to be removed. Is that correct?

If a person came to the city and said, hey, I need to remove this, it's hazardous or it's an emergency. If it's half broken and it's very obvious, then we would just permit that. We would take a look at it. It would be fine. If it was something that from our eyes looked fine. Then they, you know, they're like, no, it's dead on the inside. Usually they, they would have to provide us some sort of basic report. All the information there is what they would have to. And, and, and in essence, we kind of do that now for other different things when it relates to trees is they would have to provide to us, like if it's in a critical areas, they have to show us an arborist report. And again, there's certain qualifications of what, um, they have to be licensed and meet all the qualifications. They would provide us a report that says, yes, it's dangerous or it's dying or it's diseased, and their recommendation is removal. And then in most cases, if we don't have any reason to doubt that, we would accept that and allow them to remove the tree. If on occasion, like I said, I think in, we do this similarly for certain wetlands. There are certain things that are very obvious we can do in-house. There are certain ones that, due to the complexity of it or questionable of it, we do have an on-call for that as well. So there's a little bit of judgment there of how obvious it is. But yes, in most cases, they're going to provide it for us. We're going to review it. If we feel it is something we need a second opinion on, we would do that.

So they would retain their own arboriness, and we'd need to make sure that they were licensed and bonded and all that. But we would have to approve it.

Yeah. And when they do those reports, they always have all of their information that says, this is the licenses I have, this is the credentials I have, that allows me. And again, there is different levels of that. There's some basic ones, and then there's more in-depth ones, depending on what the project is.

Go ahead. May I?

Yep. So my question is, if we had had this already in place, would the new unit going in at Porter Way and Milton would have protected more of those trees, question, to on the church on 23rd if we had put this in? It would have protected more of the trees on 33rd. Yes, everything this city does costs everything. Us sitting here is costing this city. This is something that the state is saying we want to try to protect the urban environment with trees. There's a state RCW planning work very diligently on this, and we really compromised. We worked as a team, and it's the first time I've really seen a really team approach to something for the city that didn't give one person a benefit over the other, meaning citizens, businesses. I brought up that, okay, we don't know what the canopy is right now. Well, we have drones Get the drones up there. Let's see where the trees are. It gives a history for now. But we have been caught in this city so many times. And I was on council. I was on planning in 15. We have been caught because we've delayed doing something that makes logic. But yet we know it may not be perfect. We know it's not perfect, but it gives us a start to protect the city. It was a mill town. Trees are our love. And yes, we have a budget, but I very ardently say we can't wait anymore on passing this.

So just to clarify just a little bit. And then I will introduce our guest. There's not a specific RCW that says we have to have a urban forest tree ordinance in this form. It does in our comp plan tell us that we have to protect the environment and trees are part of that. So there's the overall with the comp plan and the growth But it's not the same as like the housing ordinance where they say you have to have this. It's with that. So this is Ben Thompson. And perfect. This is fine timing. We're just sort of starting to talk about some of those different changes we're doing. So I've asked him to sort of talk about the benefits of urban forests. And then he's here. to answer questions that may come up for all of that. So I can do slides or you can.

All right. Can everyone hear me just fine? Yeah, I feel like I'm echoing it off to get closer to the microphone.

OK, perfect.

Well, thanks, everyone, for having me. Ben Thompson, Urban and Community Forestry Program, Washington State Department of Natural Resources.

Let's see if you just roll this. Oh, roll it. Yeah. OK.

So just to kind of orient us to what our program does and who we are, we provide technical, educational, and financial assistance. We have our own section in the RCW 7615. And I would say from our program started in about 1990 and from 1990 up until about 2021, we operated explicitly and exclusively with funding from the US Forest Service. We would get a grant from them for between four and $500,000 a year. to provide these services to cities and towns, counties, tribes, 501c3 nonprofit organizations, educational institutions, and schools statewide. So it was a huge audience, not very much money, not a lot of resources. We supported two staff positions with those dollars, as well as a statewide advisory council. So I described ourselves as kind of a squeaky wheel program. If folks were engaged with us, if they were asking for assistance and for help, then we would do our best to respond. We didn't do a lot of proactive outreach during that time. Things changed in 2021. We got our first significant funding from the state legislature. We received roughly $3 million in that legislative session. That allowed us to expand the size of our staff team. And where we had one person providing all of that assistance across the state, we now have four people that are dedicated to technical assistance across the state. as well of a number of other positions. We have someone dedicated to financial assistance. He's our financial assistance planner. And so we do a few other things. We also are getting involved in statewide data collection work for urban forestry, which is in its very early stages. And I can talk about that more if you want. We also have recognition programs. We help manage the Tree City USA program in partnership with the Arbor Day Foundation. And we launched our own Washington State specific evergreen community recognition program as well. Most importantly, we're non-regulatory. So there's no mandates. There's no requirements. We're not here to tell you what to do or how to do it. We're here to help you troubleshoot. We're here to help you get your questions answered and learn maybe a little bit more about what other communities are doing. So I won't read the words on the slide here, but generally speaking, we consider an urban forest to be the sum or the collection of trees within a specified area. So within your city limits, it's the collection of all the trees that are here, whether they're on private property or public property. whether that public property is owned by the city or the school district or some other special use district, and whether that private is like residential homeowners or commercial business areas, all of these trees are collectively working together to provide benefits to the community. We typically describe trees as providing environmental, economic, and social benefits. I wanted to say technical, financial, and educational, but that's the services we provide. So yeah, economic, environmental, and social benefits. And so this is actually a screen grab from a project that we co-funded with Department of Ecology, primarily targeted to stormwater engineers, but also relevant to anyone who's interested. It's called the Trees for Resilience Toolkit. I would encourage you to look that up. And I do have a QR code at the end that's going to have some access to resources, and I believe this is on there. But of course, I think most people understand that there is an environmental benefit to trees. But I think the important thing to consider with all of these various environmental benefits is that when you lose trees, you not only lose the amenity value of that tree or those trees, but you increase the impact of the adverse effects of not having the tree. So I often say that nature or trees or any kind of impervious or any kind of pervious soil is that it's like the antidote to all the pervious cover that we need in cities. Like we need streets, we need sidewalks, we need buildings with rooftops. All of those surfaces generate stormwater runoff, all those surfaces trap and hold heat. And so the planting of trees in and around those areas offsets the burden of the inherent environmental, the negative environmental impact that comes with, that is the trade off to having these important pieces of city infrastructure.

So we can kind of buffer the impact of our own construction of a city by having trees.

We also tend to say that trees are considered municipal infrastructure, right? Just like we manage roads, streets, sidewalks, utilities, et cetera, we also should be managing our trees. And if done correctly, they're the only, piece of municipal infrastructure that actually can increase in value as they grow, whereas as soon as you build something, it starts to devalue as soon as you're done building it, because it starts to degrade, and then it has to be periodically replaced. The tree will increase in value if it's well maintained and it's kept watered until at such point it reaches the end of its own natural life and needs to be replaced, but such is true with any piece of infrastructure. But this is the one piece that can increase in the meantime The other message I often give folks about the environmental benefits of trees is that when you build the sidewalk, it helps people get from A to B. When you build the crosswalk, it helps people cross the street safely. When you put up the street light, it illuminates that space that's directly underneath it. When you plant the tree, it's helping to provide not only the environmental benefit of being shade, cooling the air, providing wildlife habitat, but it's doing all of this other work for communities. It's providing a sense of place. It's providing a sense of character. The trees can contribute to the whole culture and feel and vibe of a community. It can encourage people to be outside if their environment is comfortable, which can increase social cohesion and bonding between residents. There's just many, many other benefits beyond that. I spilled into this slide a little bit already. Certainly when you're setting up your community festivals, they often happen in parks or in these kind of pavilion areas where there is a shade amenity that's provided by trees. I don't remember what the stats are, but I was talking to another city recently that was talking about putting in like anchored post to pull shade cloth like over playgrounds and it was it was it was crazy expensive, I mean it was like. Just to purchase install into periodically retain it as that plastic netting degrade like photo degrades over time. I wish I could remember the number, but it was like it was a mind boggling number, whereas like for a few hundred bucks you can plant some trees and wait for them to provide shade but nonetheless. it's something. Did you have a question.

I did on the other slide at the bottom. Yes, what is GI know the next one next slide.

equity and oh gee that's an abbreviation for green infrastructure green infrastructure green infrastructure yeah so the there's. it's worth making distinction there's green infrastructure and green stormwater infrastructure. When the stormwater engineers refer to green infrastructure, they're usually referring to green stormwater infrastructure, which is like bioswales and other sort of built Structures that use plants and soil to help filter water. But then green infrastructure more broadly can be basically any vegetation and any forested areas any wetlands any creeks anything that's done built can be considered green infrastructure any biological components yeah. I mentioned urban heat, and I will fully admit I don't know a lot about the city of Milton. I haven't spent a lot of time here, but even just driving in, coming up the hill to City Hall, it's a marked difference from coming off the highway from Fife and Tacoma area. This is a little oasis here in Pierce County amongst this big urban landscape that we're all a part of. And so undoubtedly it is cooler here in Milton in the summertime than it is in surrounding landscapes where there is less benefit, there's less shade, right? So again, where we, you know, typically like from the urban centers to let's just say the Cascade Mountains, you'll see cooler temperatures as you get closer to the mountains because you have more shade trees, more cover, more nature, less impervious cover, less streets, less roads, less buildings. So it stands to reason that by putting more trees into urban spaces, we can offset that urban heat island. Most of us at least lived through the 2021 heat dome here. That was a significant event. People lost their lives. That is also the catalyst for the funding that we received from the state legislature. So there's a direct correlation between urban heat and urban forestry. I often will say, too, that trees are a cost-effective way to address pressing issues like urban heat. And while we're at it, we're also mitigating stormwater as well.

Yeah, there's another acronym there, CSO under the 837,000 gallons.

What is that one? Oh, combined sewer overflows, probably. I'm not 100% sure, but that's my guess. And then this is just one table that characterizes economic benefits. I believe this is nationwide. The data is from 2017. The study was published in 2021. But it's just, if you've got two houses that are going up for sale and they're considered comparable by every measure, by square footage, by location, by number of bedrooms and bathrooms. And you're built any of those things you wanna compare and contrast online. And one of them has well manicured yard with shade trees and the other one doesn't. Well, that one with the manicured yard and shade trees is gonna sell for a lot more because there's, There's also a part of the reason I think it's subconscious and it's a little bit psychological, but it communicates a level of care. If the people had enough to care this much for the outside of their property, I can only imagine that the house itself is in much better condition as well. This slide was taken from a project that we did here in Washington in partnership with the national non-profit organization known as American Forest.

American Forest created this tool called the Tree Equity Score Analyzer.

They have a companion tool called the Tree Equity Map. Tree Equity Map is nationwide. And you can go to the Tree Equity Map and zoom in on Milton. But then there's also this Tree Equity Score Analyzer tool, which provides more granular information So there are some pieces, some details you can get from the map that you can't get from the analyzer. And I regret that I can't remember exactly what they are. But the analyzer is intended to be a planning tool. You can zoom in even down to the parcel level to get an estimate of what the canopy is on a given parcel. And so it looks primarily at census tracts, not necessarily city limits. But my colleague, Zama, who put some of these slides together, kind of averaged the tree equity score. And the score is not a percent canopy. The score is kind of just a measure that they came up with. It's like out of 100. So it's relative. And so by the numbers, Milton looks pretty good. Because its current canopy cover is between 20 and 30%. Most of the larger cities in the Puget Sound region that have assessed their tree canopy, they're under that. I can't remember exactly what they are off the top of my head. I'd have to look them up. But you're doing very well for canopy, right? And the canopy cover goal of 50% is assigned by the algorithm built into the tool. So it's not to say that that's where you should be aiming for. Having 50% canopy in any kind of urban area is difficult, just because anytime you've got built infrastructure, you've got less space for trees. So there's a trade-off. There's only so much plantable space. Most of the space that you have, most of the trees that you have are on private property because that's who owns most of the land collectively. In a smaller city like Milton, you probably own, like the city probably has control over 10, maybe 15% of the land area if you add up like the land that the library is on, the land that the schools are on, the land that takes up the public right of way. So even if the city invests heavily in planting on its own property, which is encouraged, that is not, it doesn't significantly adjust for any kind of canopy loss on private property. It's good and it's helpful. It sends a message to residents. The city's interested in this. They're taking it seriously. They're investing in their own property. But most of the benefit from the urban forest comes from the trees on private property, because that's where most of the trees are. And so it says by this calculation, Milton needs about 7,000 more trees to reach a canopy cover goal of 50%. But the important thing is that assumes no net loss. So if you've ever seen a news article about a city that's trying to, oh, yes, Jason.

I had a question about the coverage. So the percentages, are those based on places where you actually can grow trees or is it just based on the land area?

it should be based on areas where you can grow trees. So that's one of the things that is important to consider. It's not just like, Oh, let's, let's just assume that anything's plantable. Um, the algorithm that assesses canopy cover does delete the land area. That's not buildable. Now it's, it's estimating right it doesn't know milton specifically so um some areas that may not be buildable like let's say some uh let's say you've got a piece of land that was like that was capped for pollution or something and you can't plant on top of the cap because it's going to disrupt the cap like the algorithm's not going to know that right so there are some things on here and it's like it's not a it's not a perfect tool but it's a good conversation starter yeah and how current is this information this slide

Let's see. We just built this tool.

We launched it about a year ago. I believe the data is from 2020. It's from 2023, I think, is the data. We had to get creative with some of the data sets because we found that one data set Like we had two different data sets we were comparing and contrasting and they both estimated certain areas better than the others. So we kind of like took the pieces we liked best and mashed them together. And I am not a tech person, so that's as detailed an explanation as I can give you. But anyway, it's a free tool. When you go to the Tree Equity Score Analyzer site, you have to create your own account to log in. It just requires an email address to create the account. It's not asking for a bunch of personal information. But the no net loss piece is important because if you, I've never seen a city gain tree canopy without some kind of specific investment by the city in maintaining or increasing canopy. So it's not something that's just gonna happen by itself and therefore it's not something that we can take for granted. So without knowing anything about Milton, without seeing any specific data, I can pretty much guarantee that you're losing tree canopy. The question is, is how fast is it happening? And I don't know the answer to that because we'd have to go back and do like a time one and time two analysis to say like, this was your canopy according to aerial satellite data circa this year, and that this is what it is now. And we're going to subtract one from the other and get the difference. And that would give you an idea. But so then it's just a question of like, you know, that question can be answered, but there's a, there's a degree to which it's not, super helpful. That's interesting to know the answer, but if you know that you're already losing tree canopy and that you're probably gonna continue to lose tree canopy without some kind of specific investment or dedicated effort, then the most important thing is like getting the dedicated effort moving, right? And then as you learn more about things, you can go, it's a common message we give to cities is like, Sometimes it can be overwhelming if the city doesn't have a dedicated person for this, if they haven't previously and specifically invested in urban forestry, you'd be like, well, this is really overwhelming, and where do we get started? And it's like, anywhere. Whatever is the most logical place to get started for you, do that first. Do that, get started, learn from it, iterate, make changes over time. But starting is the most important thing, because the reason I know you're losing tree canopy is just to think about it this way. If I'm a private property owner in Milton, and I decide that, maybe I just bought a house, I just moved in, and I decide like, well, I'm really into gardening, and these trees that are in my yard are just, they're getting in the way of my future gardening dreams, so I'm gonna just remove them, because that's my property, and I can remove my trees, and this is what I want. So you can have a higher tree company come in, and let's say they remove three mature trees that took like 60 to 80 years to get to their current size. It's providing a lot of canopy, providing a lot of benefit, Well, those trees can be gone in a day, right? But then if you wanna get them back, you gotta plant three new ones and wait 60, 80 years to get them back. So it's very easy, it's very fast to lose tree canopy in a specific area. It's very hard to get that canopy back because it's assuming that those trees are gonna be alive in 60 years, because they're gonna continue to be watered and continue to be maintained properly.

Just a super quick comment. Puget Sound Regional Council displays a tree canopy coverage map. And so what you've really highlighted is the source of the data makes a difference. Their numbers show Milton in the census tract that Milton occupies is about 21% of tree canopy coverage. But I don't know the metrics and you're helping to illuminate.

Well, this current canopy cover, there was nothing below 20 and nothing above 30. It means you might have one census area that's like 28% or 29% or maybe even 30%, but the other ones are going to be low enough that if you average them out, then that Puget Sound Regional Council data might still be correct. Thank you. So both can be true.

How much land in the state of Washington is preserved for urban development or just for forestry alone protected as far as the big picture, instead of the two miles of Milton, the big picture in Washington?

Oh, like how much is specifically protected from urban development? I don't know the answer. But, I mean, anything that's, any forested land that's owned by the government is probably off the table for development. So anything owned by the Forest Service, anything owned by the Bureau of Land Management, anything owned by the DNR, Fish and Wildlife owns their own properties. Like, any of that stuff is off the table.

But...

Yeah, unless there is, I mean, like DOT actually owns quite a lot of land themselves. So if, I don't know. I mean, basically like if it's not specifically owned by a government agency, then there's no reason it can't be developed essentially.

So is there a way to kind of say what measurable increase in the statewide or regional urban forest canopy result from a really strict ordinance in Milton? Milton being like 0.004% of Washington's area.

I mean, I mentioned at the onset of this presentation that we were kind of getting started in the data collection realm for our program. So someday we'll be able to answer that question. I can't right now. But in some ways it's kind of like, well, to what end is that information useful? It's like for us to know, Like, hey, by and large, overall, if we take all the cities that have tree ordinances that do a specific thing, like, is there something in common amongst all those cities that we could draw from that based on what else we know about the city? So let's overlay all the cities that have tree protection ordinances and see if they have more canopy than cities that don't. Like, that's an interesting question that we can't answer because we don't have all that data yet. Yeah, there was a couple of questions, I think, but.

Can I go? Okay. I've got the thing on my phone right now, and I find it very interesting. It shows the 87, says our priority is moderate, and we have a cover of 31%, and the goal was 50%. But my question is, the population shows as 1,174, so what does that mean?

You could be, it's possible you're selected on a specific census tract, and that's the population within that census tract.

It is, you're correct. I see the block out.

Okay.

Very good. So that's how we can understand the map.

Mm-hmm.

Okay.

Yeah, it's... Okay, cool. Sorry, was there another one? Sorry, I was there. Okay, I think the question about what's the impact of what we do here and how does that benefit the region? I think it's, even though we can't answer it inherently, I think that there's enough shared understanding that trees provide these benefits. more trees will help kind of float these benefits across the region. And so, just like a resident can do their part by protecting trees on their own property, like a city can do their part by investing in urban forestry in their local community, knowing that it does have an inherent benefit, it does have an inherent value. And I think for Milton, if you already see yourselves as kind of a little, green dot, a little oasis that's surrounded by urbanization. If you don't have something to sort of protect that that's specific and intentional, then that reputation's at risk overall.

I see your stat there about the US losing 1% of tree canopy or urban trees. And your comments about we will lose canopy, just from a logical standpoint makes sense. Do you have any data or ideas about how municipalities can regain tree canopy and how difficult that is? Like what type of growth could even be achieved?

Sure. Well, so that's another piece of feedback that we will often give to cities when they say like, hey, our mayor is really interested in increasing tree canopy and they want to increase tree canopy by 10% before their term is over. And it's like... It's probably not. It's very hard. It's very hard to get 1% increase in tree canopy just because if you went out and planted every available planting space today in the city of Milton and then came back in three years to see how you're doing, those trees are still so small. The canopies have not expanded very much. They're roughly the same size as they were when they were planted because they're finally just reestablishing the root system that was cut off before they were planted. So you don't really see a lot of movement or a lot of change. Like you're gonna have to wait for a good period of time before those trees are making measurable impact. And once they're established and they'll start growing faster, then they'll start making a bigger impact. So it's, I talked to Zama about this when she had this on the slide. So it's interesting that you brought it up, but it's like 1% of urban trees is still a ton of trees. It's like we're talking hundreds of millions of trees in that 1%. I think the city of Spokane has over 200,000 trees in their tree inventory, and that's just trees that they have responsibility for. And it's not even all the trees they have responsibility for. Obviously, Spokane's much bigger than Milton, but I don't know if I'm answering your question.

Yeah, I think you get it. Well, and maybe to that point, I assume that 1%, it only has a couple... data points to give us that number, but I doubt that we're seeing anywhere where it trends up.

Not by accident. I think City of Tacoma did recently, because they've been measuring tree canopy over time, for probably close to 20 years now. So they did see their first increase in tree canopy in one particular, I don't know if it was a neighborhood or a census tract, but they were like, yeah, we did it. Like we've been working on this for decades and we finally just got like a little bump, right? So it means it's working, yeah. Sorry, was it a question?

Yeah, I was just, so I know we're,

presenting on kind of the importance of the trees and everything, are we okay to talk about some, like, ways to kind of close the gap on the bridge to approving what we've been presented? Yeah. Okay, so my main issue is I have no issue with, like, anything that's being developed. So vacant lots, lots being Lots that are having accessory dwelling units being put on them. Development of any kind, let's not cut trees down or let's severely limit it, right? Which is what the whole point of this is, right? Where my issue is is I also want, I'm for individual property owner rights. I'm for people being able to manage their property as best as they see fit. The development on Porter Way, You know, I would have loved to see a lot more trees left on that lot. Same thing with the church lot. I don't know of a lot of people that buy a house and then, you know, I know it was just an example, but for dovetailing on your example, that buy a house and then cut a bunch of trees down to plant a garden. And it could be anything, right? It's a good example. It's just usually people aren't cutting trees down for minor conveniences. So those things I'm for. So if we could try and bridge that gap, I have some potential suggestions. I know we talked about loopholes being an issue, right? So my two, the two ways I see that we could move forward easiest is either we approve the whole thing right now without the restrictions on existing single-family residence that aren't about to develop or subdivide or anything like that. Or here are some potential loophole closes, right? So maybe we have these restrictions on people until they've lived in that residence for a certain amount of years, like, for example, two to five years. Another one would be, I think it's six trees, significant trees can be removed per year right now. Maybe we reduce that to one to two without a permit instead of six, or whatever it is right now. um make restrictions to cut trees uh prior to selling the residence so that people can't just hey you're gonna buy my my property i'll cut the stuff for him just pay me and i'll i'll cut it for you because i know that they don't want that happen let's close the loophole on that um highly restrict cutting for any kind of development at all i'm in favor for and then uh I guess I already touched on the lots potentially being subdivided. So those are some of my suggestions that would mean I would be in full support of the thing right now. So either we approve it without the thing and then try and close the loopholes later, or we can try and figure out ways to close the loopholes now, which might take some time, which mean more trees are gonna get cut. And then once we have a whole bunch of loopholes tried to be closed, then approve it.

Yes, Council Member Charles.

A question on that, please. We've had a property recently, single-family home, got the approval for three ADUs. So that's private property. They're putting in the ADUs. So how do we fix that? I understand the concept of private property rights. I believe in that, but I also believe in the whole. And I think more clarity on what's allowed and not allowed is needed because people will say, well, the law didn't say I couldn't do it. well, we should say, well, this is what you could do because there were big old trees cut down for ADUs and there are more and more ADUs gonna come in this city. So I'm asking how we would address that.

So I don't know exactly what the legal writing up of that would be, but I included in one of my examples of anybody building an accessory dwelling unit. I assume there's permitting involved with building an accessory dwelling unit, so there should be some way to limit the trees being cut down in lieu to building accessory dwelling units. Thank you.

Councilmember Ternes, you had a question, you had a question.

Yeah, that was what I was gonna address is the ADU issue. I 100% agree, especially on big spaces where we've seen on Porter Way and the church where they've gone out and taken all the trees without. And I know the church has said that they're going to be planting more and I'm very thankful to hear that. But on a personal property, I believe that the cost of living here in Washington State is skyrocketing and you can see people are struggling and they're trying to figure out how can they create, you know, being able to sustain living here in even Milton that costs the taxes have gone up significantly. And if somebody chooses to do an ADU in their backyard, which means taking down trees, which means they don't have the space to replant those trees as well, I think that's something to consider. And even what you said regarding somebody that wants to take out trees and plant a garden, well, the cost of foods have gone up. So if they're looking at sustaining their you know their stomach instead of their tree situation like you have to weigh that against that as well or a child you know you have kids in your yard you want you know, a safe environment. Climbing trees is great. I used to do that, but there's definite risks. I've seen that with my grandkids now, but putting in place structures takes space as well. So I just feel like there's more individualized discussion on an individual property owner that there's a bigger picture that we're having to address now in this time and season.

Just real quick, and then we'll go to, so just to go over the slide real quick. So for just a refresher for developed properties, meaning it's got a house on it or it has a business on it. Under the proposed code, there would be no, for exceptional trees, no removal unless determined to be hazardous or an emergency and replacement trees were required if below the credit, if it dropped it below the credit amount. And then significant trees, very similar, hazardous, emergency or prohibited, The current proposal would allow, depending on, again, it depends on the parcel size. If it's a small parcel, you might be able to do two over a five-year period. If it's a larger parcel, you might be able to do up to 10 over a five-year period, but no more than two at a time if they're healthy. And again, we're looking at a minor permit, again, suggested 75, but that is not set because that would be adopted by council. And just to address the... We're talking about, you know, you're talking about loopholes or this and that. We definitely, from a legal standpoint, you can't get, from both a legal standpoint and a practical standpoint, you can't get real specific, you know, on ownerships or this or that because how do we track all of that? I mean, we have cases that we have had people who they buy a house because they can take all the trees down. They take all the trees down. then they come in and tell us that they're going to build whatever they're going to, you know, some ADUs. They could have kept some of those trees. It wouldn't have stopped them from maybe, you know, from doing that, but it was easier for them to do that. And you have to weigh the, again, what we were just talking about is the loss of a large tree where they could have adjusted the ADU and kept that large tree. Not to say that you can't ever take a tree down, and maybe that's where some of that conversation comes in is maybe, you know, is talking about, you know, is that minimum tree credit appropriate? Maybe you can take down a tree or something without, you know, where are those? I don't know. But there is, it's going to go to Council Member McNally-Martinez next. But just sort of kind of doing that framework of examples that we're dealing with is that that's what is, that has been happening more and more, is people are buying a property, taking all the trees down, then coming in to want to build.

Couple questions. You said that you used Burians as an example to put a plan together and that was the middle of the road. But when I was doing some searching on this, Burians is pretty intense. It's pretty restrictive for the private owners. And I looked at other Pierce County and closer communities around us, and most of our cities around here don't have specifics like we do for the private property homeowners. There's a lot of developmental for developing, which I don't think anybody disagrees with because I'm with everybody else. When I saw those trees go down on the corner of Porter and Milway, you know, it's very, very sad. But I also know that Washington State property rights, there's a reasonable use principles that homeowners should have that are paying property taxes that own their residents. I have no problem with somebody taking trees down and plant a garden. I can give you an example. Let's say somebody has a, well, you can tell me how it would be handled if this passes. Let's say I have two Douglas firs, 30 inch diameters on the side of my house. I have a quarter acre lot and I want to, it's dropping sap on my cars. It's causing damage on my roof. I want RV parking. So now I wanna remove these trees for RV parking. They're very healthy trees.

Sorry, you need to use the mic so that it's recording.

You know the ordinance that you're putting out. What is it gonna entail for me as a homeowner with two trees that are on your exception list? on the side of my house to put RV parking. What would I have to go through?

So a couple things there. One, Burien's, I guess, is the middle of the road for those that have, are truly doing like an urban across the board forestry plan. Yes, a lot of cities, especially on the east side of Pierce County are like ours where we don't regulate anything. But the ones that are starting to regulate, they felt like they're, and I talked to the Burien and he said they were trying, like when they were looking at credits and different things and the cost and stuff, they were trying to find in the middle of the road. So it depends on how many trees are on your property. If those are the only two trees on your property that you are removing, you would be allowed to, but then you would need to plant back the equivalent of eight credits. So that could be eight small trees. It could be four medium trees, something to that effect. If you already have, let's say you have three extremely large trees. Oh, you would simply just, we would have an application. You would come in. with your application, we'd have to, you know, and it would, whatever we decide to make it and say that I need to remove these trees, this is the size of those trees, I'm applying because, you know, they're healthy, this is how many other trees are on my property, and we would look at that and compare it to the code. And so, fingers crossed I'm getting this right. In this case, you would be able to take down those two trees Let's say you've got a third tree that's a... Now, if it was an exceptional tree, if it's a significant tree, so it's under a certain size, you could take the two down. If they were exceptional trees, meaning that they are really large, over 30 inches, or hit certain thresholds, I'd have to double check. Those would not be easily removed. So the first, and again, this is the challenge before you and the challenge that the planning commission looked at is there are houses that because of rock walls or sidewalks or whatever can't do certain things and or wetlands or a creek. And so you have to decide where is that value to the community? Is that value to the community to maintain a 30, 40 inch tree worth compromising. We do that for building rights, we do that for stormwater rights, we do that for other things. So it's where that line is and that's what you guys get to decide. I'd like to go and hit a few other people if that's possible before we come back, is that okay? Yeah, Cedar and then I.

Thanks, yeah. I just want to say a couple ideas. I know you all have heard from me many times before, but I want to be real clear about some things that we've talked about. So starting from the plan, the 2044 plan, this is what is critical about everything that we've heard tonight. The long-term planning is what we need to be considering. That 2044 plan isn't something that's supposed to vary by administration or election. It's designed over time, deliberately, to be Milton's goals. And I would encourage everyone to just think about that as they're thinking about balancing the interests. Of course, personal property interests are important, but we see those all the time. You can't build your house a certain way because of zoning codes. You can't build in certain locations on your property because of wetlands. You can't block someone's view of the road. I mean, there's all sorts of times we see that. So this is an instance where we're talking about building Milton for the future and gosh, I rally about it all the time. What is the actual vision of the small town Milton? People talk about it all the time, but tell me what it is. Because I think it involves trees, the sense of place, like all those good things we get from trees. And there's not a single bad side. The only bad side, and I'm trying to, I really want to understand the position, but I think the only bad side I hear is, you know, I might want to use that for something else. My understanding of looking at this very closely now several times is it's actually not that hard. You just have to plan your property and have a site plan. So I get that people don't want to lose control of some little niche in their property. But boy, the community has told us time and time again, they want this. And if we're going to not do it, then we better have a darn good explanation for our kids when we lose 1% a year and we have no trees left because we're not going to get them back. So I am going to support this in its full-fledged, full-voiced write-up as it is because I don't want to let perfection be the enemy of good. I want to get this done so I can walk around Milton in 30 years while I'm still here for another 30 years. and say, yeah, this is what the city we built. So I got to get that out there. Sure, it just makes people mad and dig in. I hope not. I hope you'll hear me and look at that long range plan and think about what it means and why we did it, why it was done by the council before us and before us and before us.

Anyone who hasn't spoken, take an opportunity. Matt's first, sorry.

Oh, I'm sorry.

First, I want to thank our guest for being here. And I wanted to see if my notes are accurate. I know you tried to send it to us, Angeline. Thank you, but I couldn't open it. Yeah. Milton right now has 87% equity in tree equity on that one side, and we are 31% of current cover or in the TESA things.

Well, I think the, I'd have to go back to the slide. I think that the score was 84, not 87. And that's not a percentage. That's just a, that's just a metric that's assigned. That's relative to other cities that have tree equity scores and other census tracts.

And you mentioned that we're doing good, right? That Milton is excellent right now, especially compared.

Relative to your neighbors in Pierce County. Yes.

Yeah.

The canopy cover, the way the map organizes it, it varies by census area. So some areas are a little bit lower, some areas a little bit higher, but the results from that map show that you don't have any census areas with less than 20% canopy cover and none with more than 30%. So what the specific overall average is for the city, I don't exactly know, although, I'm sorry, I don't know your name. Smiley? Whalen? Oh, sorry, excuse me. Yeah, Councillor Whalen pointed out another metric from the Puget Sound Regional Council. And so it sounded like that number would make sense. It would jive with what I showed here. I just don't know that,

And we don't have specific data. And we haven't done any drones or we don't have a tree inventory for Milton. I'm just knowing. In my mind, I want to know if we're asking the homeowners to give up rights on their own property, we need to have a reason for it. I mean, if we have 80... I wrote down 87% social equity as our score. To me... And I heard you say a couple of times we're brand new at gathering data. Do we know when specific data for Milton might be available?

Well, specific data for, well, so let me see. The Puget Sound Regional Council, I did not look at that before I came to this meeting. It's possible there's something there that shows specific canopy coverage for the city of Milton within city limits. Typically, that data doesn't exist unless the city specifically commissions the report for it. So if the city of Milton wants to invest in that, then that would be your best way to get that information. The Department of Ecology purchased canopy data for the state. We have a copy of it at DNR. It's available for download from DNR's website. I think it's also available from Ecology. When we were building this tool, our contractor used that data set initially and was like, hey, we're seeing some places where things don't quite line up. And so, you know, it's a the technology is a blessing and a curse. It's cool. It's great that we have different data sets and like different things to choose from, different tools, different methods. Not a single one of them is going to be perfect for every use. So it's, I think the benefit of these types of data sets are really in the conversation starting and not necessarily, if you want to start parsing like, well, this data set says that we're at 23% and this one says that we're at 26%. And it's like, You're somewhere between 23 and 26 if that were the basis of the if that if that's where the two endpoints were the upper and lower right. So if you Commission a study with a consultant that will look at a specific data set, they will say for this data set that was where the imagery was taken at this time, according to our assessment, this is what your canopy cover is.

So climate change is a reality, and trees obviously are a benefit to impede some of the change due to human factors. I'm personally an outdoor guy. I like going hiking. I like going to the mountains, enjoying the outdoors, fresh air. So we need to understand the intent of this, which is to maintain and preserve our tree canopy. I agree with Councilmember Cedar as far as, yes, we need to respect people's rights, homeowner rights, et cetera, but at the same time, we need to understand the greater reason for this. And it is our kids, future generations, right? It's so tough to replace tree canopy, as was mentioned, you know, 20, 30, 40 years, whatever it may be. So when we're cutting a tree for, you know, have an RV cover or have an ADU or whatever it may be, it takes a long time to replace that tree. And I understand people, they deserve the right to do what they will with their property to a certain extent. But at the same time, we've got to understand the greater good of our entire world, community, et cetera. You know, here in Milton, yes, we need to understand that we're working towards, you know, improving our canopy. But at the same time, hopefully that is an impression to the rest of the world. I know other people in other countries also take great pride in maintaining our trees. And as we can see, there's huge change in the world right now as far as our environment in a negative way. And trees would definitely help to reverse that hopefully. So again, I am in full support of this ordinance as well. One thing I would potentially consider though, is a little more burden needs to be placed on businesses, because the tree credit from my understanding, is not the same for residences versus businesses. And I know there's certain reasons that you explained previously, Anjali, regarding that, but I still feel businesses that have the capacity, ability, money to do so should maintain the tree canopy as well. Because corporations are a huge reason for environmental change, and they should also address that burden as well. So that's my two cents on that.

Angela, did you want to comment on that before I move on? Anything about businesses? Okay. I'll just say that the trees are going to be gone before we know it, in a blink. We could look at those numbers now and agree that we're in pretty good shape. We're looking pretty good. But it's not going to last unless we do something about it right now. Um, I agree with council member Cedar. There's a fine line. The example with, um, with the RV parking, making a driveway where you have trees there. Sure. The trees could restrict you, but your setback requirements also restrict you. And there's a list of other restrictions. So where do we say these restrictions are fair and these restrictions are not fair. I think for the greater good, for the future of Milton, we need to act now and pass this soon.

Yeah.

Excuse me. My microphone... I'm in full support of it. My only questions was the charging of it. Where is the money going to go? What are we going to do with it? There's a couple lines in here that Milton shall access a minimum of $10,000 penalty for each unlawfully removed tree. But then it says here it gives the list of fines. So that might, we might, maybe this needs to be clarified. Also, it needs to be well publicized. This is something that is going to hit everybody in the pocketbook that misses this. And they are responsible for knowing this. But again, we don't want to be causing undue burden if we can possibly use it with publicizing it.

Real quick on the. fines, penalties, um, we can, my thinking was towards the end, we would just, we could just focus on that a little bit and talk about if there's any alternatives that people are welcome or interested in. Um, we did get feedback, um, both from Burien as well as, um, DNR on having options is very helpful. So we can dig into that a little bit.

And then moving this out of here, too, so that it's... We can discuss that, too, yeah. Yeah, I'd like to discuss that as well. That way it's not holding up this.

Commissioner Ternus, we sort of skipped you. Did you have anything?

I do not.

Okay. Commissioner Strader.

So I joined the Planning Commission because... in part because of the tree ordinance. I spoke at the public hearing as a citizen when it did not, when it was not the Burien Code. And as a person who owns a vacant lot in Milton, I said, if everyone in Milton says they love trees, shouldn't everyone in Milton participate in protecting the trees? I have on my lot at least 22 trees. I love them. But I'll admit, when I first heard it, I went, but they're my trees. And then I thought a moment and said, wait, I want to protect the trees. This makes that happen. This makes, when I move on, a developer or me as a developer, because developers are homeowners too. Developers own the property too. single-out developers, the church property had a house on it. The house on the corner of Milton Way and Porter had a house on it. It was demolished, but if it had that house still, it would be considered a developed lot. So it's be careful when you're looking at how to make sure it only affects one party and not the other because we all say we love trees. And this is our legacy. And I agree wholeheartedly with what Council Member Cedar said. This is our legacy for the future. And I'm really proud of what the Planning Commission brought forward to Council. And there was a lot of discussion, so.

Number four, back to you. Use the mic, and then we'll .

I'm just a little bit bummed that there's no, like, effort for us to bridge that gap. It's either we have to approve it as presented or not. So I'm just a little bummed that we can't use this time to try and bridge that gap a little bit better. A couple of my suggestions for your example a while ago might have addressed it. So if somebody had to own the property for five, maybe even 10 years before they didn't have to apply for a permit, that could deter a lot of those trees being cut down. Also, reducing it down to one or two instead of the six that it is right now would help to reduce trees being cut down so fast. That's just where I'm at. Thanks. Oh, sorry.

I just wanted to address that one point briefly. On time of ownership, I can't speak for sure, but I'm fairly certain that's a constitutional violation because you're discriminating against length of ownership. You can do that for some tax purposes, but that was how they originally tried to stop people who had recently been emancipated from owning property. And so it's kind of like a big body of law. So I'm pretty sure that one doesn't work. I appreciate the bridge and the gap, though. If we have some specifics, I'm more than happy to consider them. I just think we need to protect as much as possible.

So I appreciate the opportunity to continue to work on this after it gets passed to bridge those gaps, because this is a steep learning curve for all of us. It's a big shift in the way of looking at things. Couple of comments about, well, what about the person who wants to put an ADU in their yard? There's a whole series of regulations involved in that. There's a limit on how much coverage for buildings on that lot. There is a limit as to how much land can be made impervious. So it's not just the trees are the only obstacle. So when people come in saying they want to redevelop their property, there's a lot of constraints that go into the process and say, okay, here's where you can work within and here's how we could work together to make it happen. On the issue of property rights and ownership, I hear that. And I move that towards the realm of fairness and think, for those of you who have children in a school system is my example. How do you respond to people who say, I don't have kids in the school district, I never had kids in the school district, why am I paying 30% of my taxes to the school district? The likely response from a parent will be, it's for the greater good. You're building better people, you're building a better community. I mean, there's all these things that are like, but I don't have kids in that school and it costs me thousands of dollars a year. So this issue of property rights, there's limitations to help us all live together as human beings. And I appreciate Mr. Thompson's comments in emphasizing the fact that when that big tree is gone, It's like one step forward and five steps back. It's just hard to recover and move forward to make things better and build a better place to live. The point of this ordinance was to slow down the rate of deforestation and work to get everybody in. And there's room for improvement on that point. We've got exceptions that I think we need to change. but get everybody in to the process of contributing to building Milton into a better place for more trees to live. It's in our best interest to do that. And the challenge is for us to find a way to make it happen.

Thank you.

Oh, I'm sorry.

No, go ahead.

We have an area on 19th and Emerald getting ready. their permit is in. We do not have this in place that could have protected more of those trees. Maybe they will. I don't know. The fact is, again, I want to restate, things have happened because we had nothing on the books. This is a step. We can look at it in a year or two and say, oh, man, we were We need to really listen to what Councilmember Poore suggested maybe, but give it a chance so we can stop this people coming in and not having any care for the environment in our city. Look at Milton Way. Look at how those trees have helped Milton Way with the walking. There's ways we could work together, but we have to protect things. Now, again, I agree with Councilmember Cedar. We've got to pass this now. If not, tomorrow somebody's coming in, they're going to buy a piece of property, and they're going to tear every tree down. I have a lot. I could sell mine. I got an old tree there. You've got them. They'll come in and offer you $3 million, and we want to put four ADUs on there. We don't know. We have to do something now and work together afterwards to refine it. If the citizens come up and complain, then we say we needed to do something. We're going to listen to you and bring the ideas in. Thanks.

I'm sorry.

I just had another really quick question for the Planning Commission. Did you guys look at focused-based incentive volunteer preservative development-related tree retention instead of regulating homeowners? Did we look at some incentive programs to help? Because I agree, I am not against preserving trees in any way or means. I'm just a little worried that we're burdening the homeowners unfairly in our community versus other communities in our area. So, you know, I think you're right. I think we need to get something in place, but do we need to get the most extreme in place to start with, or can we get something basic in place and then build on it? So, like John said, I hope we can find something a little in between, work together, and hopefully it will be open to that.

Is there, again, tossing out, I'm trying to be careful of answering questions, not necessarily being part of the conversation, but hopefully keeping the conversation moving. So... if you have any more talk on that you have incentives. Also, is there a way, is there, I guess, a softening maybe of what has been proposed for credits or what you can and can't take that would make it more palatable to some? And maybe tonight that's too much to think about, but is there, because I think the fear is, again, I think the Planning Commission was trying really hard to, have everyone chip in. But if the feeling is that maybe the credits need to be adjusted or we do allow up to two trees, you know, again, depending on size, there's a little thing. Maybe, you know, is there something that could be proposed to sort of soften it that still keeps it. So I hope that kind of keeps those thoughts. But you were saying incentives. Is there something specific that you were looking at or just something you want us to think about?

Thinking about instead of regulating, giving incentives to improve. You're asking what things. I don't know. I mean, has a city estimated what the average cost to a homeowner in the city of Milton would be to get permission to cut a large tree? And is there any thought of waivers for low income families? Because it looks like this is a huge process of having to get a plan and an arborist and all these things that some low income family may not afford to do if they need to remove a tree. Also, a homeowner's insurance. You know, people have been faced with homeowner's insurance being, we'll counsel you if you don't remove that tree that's touching your house. How are those going to be handled if we have a restrict thing like this? I think those are things that have to be discussed.

Turnus, I think. And then Sarah. I would love to see it broken down so you have individual parcels. But as we've seen on the bigger projects where they've taken out all the trees, if there was a way to separate the individual property from big properties as far as having permitting, because it would look different for a single family versus this big development.

I guess, again, the challenge that I think that some have experienced is we have what you would think of as single family lots that they have cut all the trees and put two ADUs on. And they were probably only eight, $9,000 square foot lots to begin with, but they can do that. So it's not just the big ones that do, but we can, if there's more information you're wanting, we can definitely try to provide that. So I'm sorry, Zaro and then Mounts, was that right? And then Roberts.

That was one of my concerns when we first started talking about this. Trees can be expensive to go to a nursery and buy trees and plant them. And if that's a requirement, if you're taking down some trees and you are required to replace trees, that is an expense. The part I'm excited about with this is once this initial thing is in place and we get it passed is the opportunity to create some sort of community to plant trees on people's properties. I've mentioned before to the commission, I've worked with the Tacoma Tree Foundation, who does a lot of work and gathers a ton of volunteers and donated plants and comes together to plant trees on people's properties who want them. And I think we'd see a lot of interest in Milton with something like that with people coming together to address that. So I think that's a very valid concern is the expense of planting new trees and taking down existing trees. That being said, I think there would be a lot of interest from community members to come together and provide support in that way.

In the discussion going back and forth, I hear it being interchanged that, well, assumed that this will work. And I'm just wondering if there's any data from other cities that have done this, that they actually stopped any trees from being taken down or We're also just saying, okay, it's going to cost a lot of money. Well, it's going to cost a lot of money if we allow the trees to be taken down. So really then it's just a tree tax, right? It's a permit. And then it's a fine if you do it anyway. And I haven't seen any data that this program in Burien or anywhere else actually prevented trees from coming down. Do you know if there's any data on that? Or is it just a way to generate revenue for the city?

A $75 permit is not a ton of revenue. It's just enough to cover our time.

A $15,000 penalty is... That's a deterrent.

So that's not...

Does it work? I guess that's my main question. Does it work?

So, yes, it would work. If you take... Let's take the most obvious one on Milton Way. Under this code, they would not have been allowed to... They would have been forced to have kept... and redesigned their plan to keep the majority of their huge trees. And under our current rules, they are allowed, basically as long as you're willing to replant small trees, you can take down everything. In the case of the properties on several, the one that comes to mind is 13th, yes, it would have prevented him from clearing his lot. He could have still built the ADUs. He just would have had to position them differently. So that would have protected those largest trees from being taken down.

So enforcement, I mean, how would we enforce that?

which it comes back to what Council Member Hall has said is, I mean, it's how we enforce anything, but it starts with education. It starts with getting all out there. The plan that, and I believe we outlined it, I can put it in a more formal, but the idea is that we would obviously use our current newsletters, Milton Days, events, whatever, to get the word out of the tree. We would notify all of the tree cutters in the, anyone who is the You know, anyone that has a business license that does tree cutting, we would notify them of all those rules. In most cases, developers are talking to us before, not in all, but we would explain to them that. So, you know, there's two different, I guess there's two different things there. There is the developer who is coming in, which has its own challenges. There's also the fear that a single property owner would take down a tree without permits and would we find them this huge amount? And that's where some of the discussion that was made both from Burien is he said, they have a couple different options, but there are options we could create that would give alternatives to simply dollar fines. So whether it's, you know, one of the suggestions was maybe they plant additional trees. If it's a financial thing, we are working part of this code and some of the projects we've been working on with the last couple of projects is, we will have a tree fund. So maybe the city, if it is a low income issue, maybe the tree, the city provides those trees to plant based on the money that we receive from developments that... can't plant as many or whatever. So there are options that we can look at if we're looking at making it softer. You wanna, and I know this is something, I'll take Commissioner Whalen's thunder on this one, but Part of the reason those are high is there are developers that will say, eh, $2,000 for a tree. I know it's illegal. I don't care. I'm going to come down. It's a business expense for me. So you want to make sure that they are high enough that you are making it a true penalty. At the same time, yes, everything is a balance and trying to figure out, is there alternatives? that we can provide in those cases where we know it was not intentional there was no you know it wasn't somebody trying to skirt around hopefully we will get the word out and like i said a lot of people do call us ahead of time um but we would notify all the tree people we would get the word out we would share like everything else we do

But there's no data that so many trees were saved in Burien after they enacted this.

I have not asked them that, no.

I don't know how you'd get that. Yeah, how would you collect that data?

And I'm sorry, we already have a development plan that's been approved and it's in place, right? So when we keep bringing development into the conversation, it's confusing me because I think we're focused more specifically on private property residential, not development.

Correct. It's both. But I guess sometimes private property residential becomes develop. I mean, yes, there is. what was stated by, I don't know who stated it, but both of those properties, both the church property and the property on Porter and Milton Way technically had a house on it and could have, under our current code, taken all the trees down at any time and then came in for development and then we would have been out of luck.

That's not what happened, is it?

Not in those cases, no. But in the case of ADUs, it is happening. And again, it comes back to where is that level of the long-term, where's that value in the long-term? And that's something that you guys get to decide.

I understand now you're saying I have a lot. I know I'm going to... going to sell it, so I'm gonna remove all those trees. I have a lesser code because I am a private owner, and then I'm gonna turn around and sell it as a development.

Well, even the buyer who buys it, he can buy it, he owns that home, it's in our residential zone, and so if we remove that element completely, they can come in and tear down all the trees, to build a bigger house or to build ADUs, and there's nothing that protects those.

Is there a way, once he buys it, even though it's private property, it's turning into a development? Is there a way you could stop it there?

Not if the rules say, I mean, if the rules say if it's got a house on it, there are no regulations, then there is a house on it, there are no regulations. Now, when he goes to build an ADU, maybe the regulation says you have to plant trees at that point.

I still think we need the regulations, personally.

And that's where I guess I come back to, you know, is there... I understand that it's a change from no regulations to regulations. I mean, obviously the Planning Commission and myself feel... that we need to have a level of regulation on single family houses. If the majority of council disagrees, then the majority of council disagrees and it doesn't pass. If the feeling is, yeah, I kind of agree, I just feel like it's too big of a leap, then maybe the direction is, is there something, because I guess that's part of where we are trying to get to is, is there a direction for staff and planning commission? Is it simply the majority don't want anything on developed property?

or is it it's too big of a leap can we find something that's maybe softer and if if it's there's maybe softer then the planning commission can work on that and that gives us better direction yeah i just i i hear what you're saying and i i like that because i you know i don't want the most extreme for our citizens i don't think anyone does um i kind of think of it a little bit differently because i think our iterative approach on so many things has historically failed, where we think, oh, we'll do a little bit, a little bit, a little bit. We just never get anywhere. And so when I think about this, I think about, as Commissioner Johnson pointed out, the large developments that, in hindsight, we wish we would have done things. Or right now, the big thing on data centers, or even the bridge development. These are the big things that come in. For me, it's easier to just put the Band-Aid on, and then we'll slowly peel it back. That's where I am with this. I want a moratorium right now on cutting down big trees. I want it to stop. And this is how we'll do it. I think it'll also lead to a lot of good developments. I mean, I think there are, well, It sounds like Commissioner Zarro might know more about this, and I'm sure you do as well, programs that can help people to get trees. Because obviously we don't want to just ruin our equity that we've worked hard to build in Milton. So those kind of opportunities will present themselves. And we can do that within the city. We have that power. But we're trying to stop these very simple loopholes that exist, or just the way we're ridden right now, where you can just kind of do whatever you want and chop it down. I don't think it needs to be a big fight, but I would love to see us get something that stops it. And then we can decide what else do we, what do we need to tone back? Because, you know, last point I'll make, and then I'll, I know I talk too much. But as far as like, what do the citizens want? I'll just come back to this. Like they've told us, we've done the outreach. We're at the tail end of this. And this was the, product of many years this isn't like this just got manifested out of nothing this came from our citizens from our constituents it just came prior to some of us you know being here so um yeah that's all i'll say thanks oh and i would love to hear from our guest speaker on programs that might exist to help bridge some of these equity gaps that we're talking about oh sure well i mean just our programs available for those services um if we go back to the last

slide here, the QR code on the, depending on what side you're on, is the left side of the screen, is just specifically the resources that we were making available for ordinance and policy questions. And it's, there's a lot there, it's a rabbit hole, right? And then the QR code on the right, I guess it's the same no matter which one, right? is just our request portal for assistance. So anyone can submit a request for assistance. So if there's future questions that come up, we can come back and offer additional commentary. We're always available to the city staff if there are specific questions that come in. If we start getting questions that are sort of like coming from the same community and they start to conflict with each other, we might say like, hold on a second, let's take a moment and figure this out. But we do offer educational resources to communities. We're, I would say at this point, pretty consistently creating new resources for not just, we don't really have anything for tree ordinances specifically. We did co-fund

a document that I think you're aware of, Anjali.

It was like the Guide for Tree Preservation Ordinances on Private Property in King County. I think so. It was a project that we co-funded just a couple years ago. It kind of compares and contrasts and gives recommendations.

What was the name of that?

Guide for Protect, how is it? Guide for Tree, Guide to Preserving Trees on Private Property in King County, I think.

Regulating trees. It's an outstanding document.

It was not produced directly by DNR, but we were a funding partner of that project. So there's things like that that come up, and like the Trees for Resilience Toolkit I mentioned earlier. But again, we're not here to levy prescriptions. So on one hand, there isn't, as was pointed out in the beginning, there's not a state requirement that cities adopt urban forestry programs. But for all the requirements that you do have that are relating to comprehensive plans and stormwater management and Puget Sound Partnership, clean water protections and wildlife habitat in critical areas, across the board, investments in urban forestry can help you comply with those various pieces. And so I think like the more you do, it's just like learning anything new. There's a thing the city has not been specifically engaged in before. It's like the more you learn, the more you learn how much more there is to do and how much more there is to learn. So it's like If the city right right now, the city doesn't have a tree ordinance. Right. So it's like putting that in place. But then is there, as was mentioned before by Michaela, I believe, talking about like opportunities for residents to get involved at a volunteer level or ways that nonprofits could offset the cost of planting trees like that's another whole dimension of urban forestry. getting a tree inventory or a canopy assessment specifically so you can measure like this is what we had and this is what we're working towards. Just like you have inventories perhaps of like your sidewalks or your facilities so that when money does come available, you know where the problem areas are and you can use that data to direct the resources there. So we do have our grant program. It's a little bit hit and miss. Again, before 2021, we had about $100,000 a year statewide in grant funds, not very much money. We had a record-breaking $8 million available in grant funds in 2024. That was mostly federal money, but some state money.

Both of those,

like that money's been all obligated to projects across the state. We I don't I hope that we could get some comparable amount of funding to that in the future but right now we're back to like the hundreds of thousands of dollars and not necessarily every single year. So there are grants that come available. We have a monthly newsletter that we publish with like all kinds of sometimes it's like a story of a particular accomplishment a community has made sometimes we're publishing like here's how to prune properly or here's how to water properly um sometimes it's just a story from like wsu extension or another partner so that that comes out monthly and that's so like we we provide a lot of opportunities for engagement sometimes we offer seminars and workshops we'll promote that for other organizations um So there's certainly ways to get involved further, but then it's a logistics question and a practicality question for city staff. It's like we can't invest in everything at once. And so it sounds like this is part of a multi-year effort to get to this point. And so let's keep going. I mean, I'm just glad that the city is having this conversation. I don't have a stake. personally or professionally in the outcome, because I don't live here. My interest is that cities in Washington are taking urban forestry seriously, and I see that in this room. It's just a question of degree, like what is reasonable for right now? What is reasonable for Milton? And you're all working together to figure that out. And that's, That's cool. So while there's no state mandate that says you have to do this, it is technically also an opportunity to say this is what we can do. We can make this decision for ourselves because this is what it means to be Milton and this is what it means for our people and our trees and our community moving forward. So there's not much more I can add, but just to say thanks and good luck. I think, I guess like... at times that I've been to like Association of Washington City's conferences or other events like that, it's like, there's a real pride in doing hard stuff because it takes a group of people sitting around the table, sharing their best ideas and coming to a consensus on what we're gonna do as a group. And in hindsight you know city council member just a general city council member anywhere will love to tell you the story about the time that they like got the funding to put in the new aquatic center or like got to the end of that big downtown redevelopment project or like attracted that like exciting new business to set up shop in their hometown. Right. This is just another one of those things. Right. So we're we're we're hashing over the details that matter. because we wouldn't be discussing if they didn't matter. But it's like, on the other side of this, there's going to be, I think, a pride that comes from it to say, maybe it didn't go exactly the way I wanted to, or I was hoping we would have done more of x, but we did something big, we did something hard, and it's for the greater good. It's for the benefit of our community. So take, I guess, if that's worth it. If the rah-rah is worth it, then take it and run with it, because that's what we're here for. We're here to support cities and encourage you to do more to protect the environment.

Thank you. And I was wondering, did the Planning Commission have some ideas on, you were talking about the softening things. Was one of those maybe not having to do a site plan? That's just an example.

No, at this point, I think that's why we felt like this meeting would be helpful for both the Planning Commission and the Council to sort of hear from each other. So I'm not sure completely. what our next steps are?

I would just suggest that the Planning Commission's sense of urgency about stopping the cutting down of big trees as we are seeing the surge in infill development, get this on the books and keep on working to refine this. site plans, getting very prescriptive about what's expected. I know these reports are detailed. You go to cities that have been doing a lot for trees, whether it's Bellevue or Kirkland, there's really user-friendly handouts to make it simple, and there are best management practices, for lack of a better word. If you go to the city portal and you look at some of the permit drawings that the city accepts, they're pretty generous when it's the drawings on the back of a napkin. This is not to make life miserable for residents, but the city has to have something to say. You gotta have a common sense of the facts. I look forward to further discussion on this and softening. There's many ways to do it, but another part of this overall getting this ordinance to you all was we were really in over our heads to try to start something from scratch. And so the interest was finding, let's find something that's fair and balanced. We used a tree credit system, which is sort of the Goldilocks between just counting the number of trees and saying you gotta have X amount, doesn't matter what size they are, or having an arsenal of drones that will survey every property that comes in to develop the volume of tree canopy The Goldilocks was a tree credit system and a simple system that prescribes one tree credit per thousand square feet of the lot. So if you have an 8,000 square foot developable area, you need eight tree credits and there's a multiple ways you can get there. This ordinance incentivize keeping as much as you can existing and then allow some more planting. This ordinance addresses so many issues and these issues that are brought up as it seems unfair. I think what's unfair as having directly experienced watching 20 exceptional trees, not to mention all the other significant trees, completely removed and how it's changed the local climate. And that change on that property, they're not paying for my increased electric bill because my house is hotter now. They're not paying. They're leaving the impacts, the burdens of the development for the rest of us to carry. That's not fair. It's not equitable. What's happening with development that's needed, but with a blind spot to just make it a tabletop, make it as convenient as possible, and ship on out, and then we're left with dirtier air, dirtier water, more storm water problems, a lot more noise to contend with, a harsher, more ugly landscape. I mean, it's just, everybody, what about our property rights in the sense of, more burden put on those of us who are trying to protect our trees. And it shouldn't just be the tree lovers who are protecting the trees. Everybody in the game means it lightens the load for all of us. And common sense tells us if we're saving trees, We're saving those from, there's a story about starfish on the ocean, on the shoreline, and somebody picking up a starfish and throwing it into the ocean, and their partner is saying, what are you doing that for? It doesn't make a difference. And the person who threw the starfish said, it made a difference to that starfish. We each have our own little part to play. There's a cost. There's a cost either way. It's a matter of which price we want to pay. And so continuing the work, I think, is what we need to do and understanding how to work things through. But the more inclusive, the more who are involved, I think is for the better. I've been listening to people at city picnics for years. I used to have a booth on my own. Tell me what you want.

So we're just about there. Is there any suggestions, ideas of what the next step could be? Michaela.

Can we request specific, if we want to make it softer, I understand receiving this all at once is a lot. If the Council wants to, quote, make it softer, first I'd suggest we pass it and then make it softer. But if that's what we want to do, I think the Planning Commission needs very specific items that the Council has concern with and specific suggestions.

Personally, I'm tired. This was quite a struggle. And I like having Band-Aids for a while. I like that analogy. I think we can make it softer, but not right now. I mean, we've seen what's happening, and I understand some of the Council's position of individual rights, but we also talk about we're a community. Our neighbors, we all want to have Milton look a certain way. And there comes a time where you have to step up and say, well, I don't fully agree with this. We've seen it in society our whole lives. But it's a step. And we haven't taken the step. And that's why we are where we are now. So if we can just put the gate up for a while, then have you all really talk about between yourselves what you all approve as easing it, and then send it later to an adjustment to that part of the bill. And I assume, again, it's for the neighborhood residential home. But I ardently believe that we have put so much energy and every single thought you have brought here today, we considered it.

Well, perhaps as a route forward, I like the idea of getting specifics to the planning commission. My understanding is that it's currently with the planning commission, so it's not ready to come back to council. Obviously, I don't think it's ready for a vote unless... No, it doesn't look like it. Okay. So I think the people that are pretty clearly pro may have some inputs as well, but could we have a deadline to get specific inputs to the planning manager, maybe a week or so? And anyone who has specific ideas we can target that section of the ordinance. Because I think what's happening, I'm very guilty of it, is we're just kind of, well, big ideas without getting into the minutiae. And so if we want to get a consensus on something, maybe we need to get in the minutiae. Or maybe it's just, you know, I'm not going to be passing it, which is certainly a position too.

One of the biggest concerns I've had is that I've lived in Milton now for over five years. I knew nothing about this. And I know you say you got comments from the public and you made a thing about it at Milton Days, but I really don't think the community outreach effort has been enough. I don't think that, well, the people that I talked to about this, I brought it up and they were floored. They're like, the city wants to what? So I really think that we should take a pause, and I know that the sky is falling, but we really need to educate the public, the Milton residents. I know it costs money for a mailer, but we really need the input of the people that this is gonna impact the most, because what I see down the road is that we are gonna be priced out of Milton. We can't afford to hire arborists. We can't afford to do site plans. We can't afford to pay fines. We can't afford, we can't, we're not able to put in ADUs to offset the taxes and everything else that's going up. But the main thing is, if we could do a push, and Mayor, I don't know, maybe this falls on your plate, could we do a Could we afford, with that new grant that we got that is environmentally purposeful, could we send the issue out and do just a survey? Just put the link to a survey and have the public do a Survey simple, I mean, we're making decisions that are going to impact everybody that lives in Milton, everybody that owns a home. We should hear what they have to say, and they should know what's going on. And I know we're out of time. Thank you. One second, please. Didn't you do, oh, I'm sorry.

We did the monkey survey for the marijuana, and very few people participated. I am all, I am crazy when people say they don't hear things because there's been more information provided this city. I've been here for 20 years. In the last 10 years, including now, Mayor, there is more information available to people than ever before. The problem is we don't have a newsletter anymore. anymore, we have Facebook page, the city has a page, stuff is there. People are so stressed in other ways, they don't have time to take an avenue. A lot of people will throw away a survey. It's a waste of money, I'm sorry.

I'm sorry.

I've lived in Milton 18 years, and I have never heard of anybody addressing this issue before. This is the first that's been brought to my attention. I would love to have a public forum where we could actually have, and I don't know if you've done that before, but I think the public should have an input on what their thoughts, I would love to hear what my neighbor's thoughts are regarding this. I've heard all of your thoughts, but I think as community leaders, that they should be allowed to have a say in what they're thinking and feeling about it.

And I kind of shadow that because, like I said, I've lived in Milton 50 years. And I've heard urban tree development, but not until I heard, wait, it's going to cost you or you can't improve your land, that it actually was like, what? What's going on? And I've done the same thing where I have said things since I've been on Council, are you aware of this to people? And people are astonished. about it. And so, I mean, you can put something out, but you need to let people know that it's going to restrict the homeowners from doing things. I don't know where the balance is, because I totally understand the need to get something passed to protect things from happening, like on Porter and, you know, these situations. So I feel that, and I feel the passion of what you guys have done, and I think it's absolutely amazing, and I think it's wonderful. But there's got to be a balance, and I don't know what the balance is. But I think if you ask our constituents, The majority of the people, if you tell them you can't remove that 10-inch tree from your property, even if your homeowner tells you, if you think it's hazardous, you know, whatever it is, you're going to get pushback. It's hard for me to think you won't.

You will. I mean, we're out of time and I don't want to take this there. So there's a lot of stuff here. I think my suggestion is if people have specific things they would like to us to address, email it to us. A week would be great by next Monday. It is, we, again, I would, I would, uh, Caution and assumption or a flat statement that information is not out there. Information has been in the newsletters. We were at Milton Days. There is a level of people don't engage until they engage. There are lots of things that we try to do. Again, some of our engagement was during the comprehensive plan, and we sent notices, I think, to everybody. It was in all of the media stuff. We had various public... forums and I think we had 20 people show up and most of them are people who show up all the time. So it's hard to get people to engage. And at some level there's also the you're elected as a role and I feel like I'm lecturing and that's really bad. There's a level of that role of you are talking to your constituents and you are representing them to make those roles. Because there are lots of things that you can't go out for everything and maybe this is that thing. I don't know. But this is what I'm hearing is let's, if people who take some time, I am available if you want to meet and have me explain, like sit down and like I said, you have really great questions and it's hard in here to do that. It's like, hey, let's work through a scenario. Happy to do that with anybody. I'm happy to do it at night if you work during the day. I'm salary. I can work anytime I need to work. So we can get some of those real specifics. If it is like, I'm okay with it, but I really don't like, the penalties are really getting me, or I don't like that there's different things, or the replacement is what I don't like. Certain things cost, some things don't. Most of the time, if you're submitting a permit, that cost is minimal. Literally, unless you're trying to prove to us that you've got a whole bunch of dead, dying trees. But if you're like, hey, I just want to take this one tree, I mean, literally we like here, here's the online thing you printed out. They chose. So some of those things are not hiring professionals for. So email to myself, which planner at city or what are we Milton wall.gov now anything you specifically want, whether it's ideas of how to reach an agreement, whether it's, I just, this is what I'm suggesting. I would be more comfortable with if it did or didn't have this, or if this was less, start with that, then we can deal that with the Planning Commission and then we can come back to Council hopefully with maybe is this a good compromise or we can't find a compromise, you guys are just gonna have to make a hard decision. If there is, again, if the Council as a whole or as a majority decides at a meeting that they want a meeting or something, then that's within your purview at a Council meeting for someone to make that suggestion and see if there's more votes for that. So I'm always looking for what's the consensus vote to direct me. With that, we are 10 minutes over. Not quite. Not quite. Oh, nine minutes over, sorry. Oh, my God.

All right, does anyone else? Yes.

Bruce. Yeah, I'd just like to say, you know, that, you know, it seems like it's going to be a net loss every year, irregardless of what the city does. And I'd just like to piggyback on what Michaela said, and, you know, me and shovels, we're never too far apart. So I would volunteer, and I think a lot of people in the community would would jump on that opportunity. I mean, if we can, you know, get some resources where we get trees cheaper somehow and have a, I would like to see Milton sponsor, you know, a tree planting day, maybe once or twice a year or something like that, where you just get the community involved and we could go to, you know, a certain address says, yes, I have room for a tree here and I would like to have you guys, you know, come on my property and plant a tree and I'll take care of it. I think that'd be a great thing.

One more thing. Back in the 60s, when I went to school here, every year we would get a free tree on May, what, May 1st? I think it was May 1st. We planted many, many trees, and I know every kid that got a tree pretty much planted it. And that was, well, 60 years ago. 60 years ago. Ours didn't make it. Neighbors didn't make it. They become diseased. But it was something the kids come home and wanted to plant. Maybe that's an option. I think it was Weyerhaeuser that actually donated them. So that is something you might be able to do to offset some of the trees that are gone now, but nothing to do with this.

Yes, Jacqueline.

I just wanted to say thank you to Council for sharing this meeting with the Planning Commission. It really helps us to understand where your concerns are a bit more, and thank you for hearing our concerns. I think it's been really productive, and I hope we do this more often. And thank you to Mr. Thompson for your really salient comments that you put what's so intangible into solid information, and I say thank you on behalf of all of us. Thank you.

This is not about trees. I'm asking everybody to respond to Megan Sheridan regarding volunteering for Milton Days. That's it, so please respond.

That's after the meeting. All right.

Okay, well, seeing all agenda items have been concluded, I adjourn this meeting at 8.12 p.m.