Board of Zoning Appeals - Regular Meeting

make sure if you're going to speak make sure your microphone is turned on all right good afternoon we're here we're going to do it we're going to vote on minutes today so we have minutes from april may and june i think isn't it that just says may but i think we have more than that that we didn't vote on we didn't vote on march april and may march april and may did anybody have a problem with anything they saw in the minutes from march april or may they wouldn't i shouldn't say problem anything they'd like to have changed that's not correct i think in april my name is incorrect

All right, I can make that change. I'm noted as Warner, but I'm actually back.

On the last page.

And there's another one.

Last page, last sentence. There's another one in the middle somewhere. Somewhere else. You don't want to change your name so we don't have to deal with this?

No, I can go incognito.

Yeah. All right. Other than that, everybody's good and happy with it? Do we have to do them one at a time, or can we do them as a group?

We can do them as a group.

Okay. I would entertain a motion to accept the minutes for March, April, and May. I second. No, we need someone to make the motion.

Oh. I move. Okay. Second. Second. All in favor? I didn't turn on my microphone. Okay. Minutes have passed. Yay!

It only took us three months. We're doing great. Okay, so, well, now I put my note away.

Thanks for noticing that I arrived at 3.30 for the last one. I was so horrified. Oh, boy.

Okay, so we have Clintonville on here. Clintonville was part of the Mansfield Avenue and Clinton Road and Grange and Fern Avenue. They have started planting trees in that area. Brian, are you close? How far along are you, would you say, with that?

I think we're getting along pretty well on it now.

I know Mansfield Avenue is starting to look pretty good.

Yeah, I think we're getting more at the end.

Okay. I don't have it on here, but you started the west end? Okay. I have a list here of all the trees that we're still working on besides West End and Clintonville if anybody would like to see that list of what's still to be done. I've got invasive removal on here. We had decided a couple years ago or last year I think we made it official that we would start an invasive removal. We would remove the autumn olive, honeysuckle and pear trees and then do some replacements and try to get those out of our environment. But we've had some really nice storms so far this year. We have lost a lot of trees and our tree removal budget has been stressed immensely. And in the last meeting, well, meeting a few ago with the mayor, he said, how about if we postpone that for a year so we can use those funds for taking care of the projects that we have to take care of because of the trees coming down? Does that sound about right, Zane? Yeah, that sounds that sounds fair kind of paraphrase it quite a bit.

Yeah, yeah, we've reprioritized hazard hazard tree removals this year. I know Randy and Tom ankle could speak to that as well. Johnny may we've I don't know the count on the number of street trees and park trees we've lost, but it has eaten a large part of our budget. We have, the mayor has reached back out to, we had applied for a grant last year at International Paper to help with funding for removing invasive species. We hadn't heard anything back and last Friday I spoke with the mayor and he's gonna reach back out to them and his contact there to see if that's something they still would like to contribute to. So I'm just waiting on information regarding that.

Since we kind of have to reallocate or move funds around, is that something we should vote on or should we just say that's what we need to do? Looking for some direction.

Before you call for a vote, can I ask a question? You can ask all the questions you want. Why does the tree commission have to take care of store damaged trees?

Well, part of our budget is tree removal and invasive and hazardous tree removal. But also, when we have street trees that come down, the city takes care of that. They get them out on the street. Randy's crew and the street parks department, they get them out on the street. They get that taken care of. But they need to be replaced. So we're going to be spending more money than we anticipated replacing trees.

So on the city's budget, they don't have, let's say a storm damage tree. It automatically falls into our money.

Yes, we are. We are the tree people.

Okay.

Okay. We're team tree.

T-T, T-square. Like Doc said, we have an account used for tree removals, and Streets has a tree fund as well. Their money is set aside for tree maintenance that they use as well. So we work together on that depending on who has money when and at what time the tree comes out. Normally the way it works, if a tree has already fallen, has come down, the Streets department are on it. They take care of it. I'll look at trees that are still standing and get those removed. And that's the line item that I work out of that budget.

Our budget. Yes.

Yeah.

Like in, like for example, let's say we had a storm damage come in. Like we have money set aside for evasive trees. But let's say a storm came in and it took down an Elm street or an, uh, maple tree. That's not invasive, but we, let's say it costs a thousand bucks to get these trees climbed up. It automatically comes out of our funds here.

Not automatically, but we, the, the budget is Arbor removals. And so that applies for both invasive and non-invasive trees. So it can be used for either.

Do you know how much we spent on cleanup? And like, you know, removing the trees, is that the same as, you know, how we lined up the tree limbs? Is that part of our money?

No, streets took care of, when a tree has already fallen, streets department takes care of it. They will, they have their own budget and they schedule and do the work on trees that have fallen in the right of way. And the cleanup after. we remove trees that are still standing, essentially.

Here's another question. You know how people will call and fill out an application for a tree? It's the same, like, do they fill out an application, hey, I got a broken tree, but it's not in the city lot right away, but can they get a tree removed?

You mean if it's on private property?

No, let's say it's not.

Yeah. If it's in the city maintained portion, whether it's a right away and a platted alley in a park, something like that, the city has the ability to do maintenance on that tree, whether it's removal pruning, what, what have you.

But there is some trees that will plant that won't be in the cities right away and be like a private property.

Yeah. Those are the projects that we work on every year. Tree city partners is one of them. That's where, residents and businesses can fill out an application those trees they get provided to them free of charge we just require that they fill the water bag that is provided with the tree every week for the first growing season which is now may through october i think we water our trees you're part of the tree nerd doc brown said we lost a lot of trees how many guests we we lost 25 to 30.

Will they get replanted?

Ideally, when we remove a tree, it's, it's in our zoning code that we replaced them. Not every homeowner or business wants a tree. So we do want to accommodate that. We want to put the best tree in the best spot. If that tree is not going to survive for one reason or another in that spot, We won't put it there, but yes, we will make an attempt to replace every tree that has come down.

Somebody asked me if it's a city tree on cities right away, who trims that tree?

We will.

How does a person notify a, this like it's right where you live that, you know, on Gambier If you come up to that light, you don't see the light because the trees overhanging, how do they apply a, this needs trimmed.

Yeah, we have an application. They can come into the engineering department and pick one up and fill it out. You can get it online as well. It's just a request to do maintenance on a tree in the right of way, whether it's removal or trimming that way we have a record of it. And I know. We have over 17,000 trees that we're responsible for that I know of, so it's kind of hard to get around and look at them all, so we really rely on people's input to let me know maintenance needs done.

How much do you think it costs our budget? Do you know that? To do what? To do the cleanup.

I don't know about the cleanup. Like I said, that comes out of street department. Once a tree is down, they do the maintenance on that. I only do removals of standing trees or pruning on trees that are standing.

No, I'm asking how much money came out of the shade tree commission to help. Do you know?

I mean, what's our total removal budget?

Can you clarify?

You know, like Doc Brown said, like the mayor requested. That, sorry, I'm hearing through my earbuds because I hear it's done. Doc Brown said the mayor reached out and said, hey, can we hold off on the evasive removal because we need to shift some money to help with that. How much do we...

So it's not to help with the cleanup. What we have is we have several trees that were damaged by the storms. So we have storm-damaged trees, right? And also just trees that, because of the winter that we had that was extra hard, just didn't do well during that winter. So we're having more trees need to be removed this year than we would typically. So we had budgeted to have these invasives removed. However, because... WE HAVE THIS LARGER VOLUME OF TREES THAT NEED TO BE REMOVED, PARTLY BECAUSE OF THE STORMS, WE'RE NOT GOING TO BE ABLE TO DO THAT PROJECT. BUT IT'S TOTALLY SEPARATE FROM CLEANUP. SO LIKE WHEN LIMBS FALL DOWN OR WHEN A TREE FALLS DOWN AND PEOPLE PULL THAT OUT TO THE STREET, THE STREET DEPARTMENT PUBLIC WORKS TAKES CARE OF THAT ENTIRELY OUT OF THEIR BUDGET. WE HAVE NOT PUT A PENNY INTO THAT. THAT HAS LITERALLY BEEN ALL and their budget on that. We are only removing trees that were damaged by the storm or by the harsh winter or even the drought that we've had. It's just been a really hard year on trees, especially the older silver maples.

And you think we got 130 of those we had to remove?

About 30. Just 30, not 130. Oh, 30.

About 30. And the silver maples, depending on their size, can range anywhere from $2,500 to $5,000. You know, if you've got just kind of a... fully mature silver maple that's in a really convenient spot that's at the lower end. If you've got a really large, you know, gnarly-looking silver maple that's in a weird alley that you have to get a crane to get around the power lines, that's where it gets really expensive. So they're on average about $3,500, I think, to have removed, not including the stump grinding.

Thanks. Thanks, Quentin. You're clear, though. Thanks, Doc.

We tried. I'm a lot more vague, I guess. So since we are going to kind of drop out the invasive program for the year, is that something we should vote on since we've decided that's what we were going to do and we're going to vote to reallocate the money towards replacements or do we just decide that's what we want to do and not make a vote?

Yeah, we never encumbered those funds to begin with. We had proposed to do the work but the money wasn't actually encumbered yet so we don't have to reallocate anything.

So we're just not doing that project.

So we're just tabling the invasive removal project for this year?

Yes, our plan is to pick it back up next year.

Okay.

Okay, all right, great. So that's where that one went.

I have America 250 and Experience Mount Vernon on here.

I know last time Experience Mount Vernon didn't have a lot going on, Have you heard anything different from that?

Well, yeah. So we basically, they're pretty confident that nothing's really going to happen like with the Master Gardener standpoint. I did tell you guys that we, they, we, sorry.

No, you're fine.

bought some really nice urns and had them on the street. And there's a few around the square, and they actually did really well during the June 1st Friday. They actually stood up really well. So basically what Experience Mount Vernon wants to do this fall is plant a whole bunch of bulbs because there's not, that plan that they were working on really hasn't come, it just hasn't happened yet. So I wasn't sure if maybe somehow we wanted to get involved. The Kenyan football team is going to be planting these bulbs for us in the fall. So I wasn't sure if we wanted to maybe help out in some way, if it was just like make a donation towards bulbs or whatever, or have some sort of, you know, But that's what they're going to do this year because Lacey Filkin's assistant, her husband is the Kenyan football coach. And we have had a lot of fun utilizing those kids for some heavy lifting. So I wasn't sure if that was something we would love to sort of like maybe just help out with, whether it's throw some money towards the bulbs or whatever, which they'll all go in in the early fall and then, you know, Next year is when we'll sort of see the fruition of Experience Mount Vernon, you know, the bulb project.

The bulbs are going to go in the planter.

No, the bulbs are going to go in the ground. The planters were just an alternative test. There was to see how they would go since we, because we're looking for color. All of us are looking for color, like to maintain and

You're right. Where are you gonna put the bulbs at, Megan?

Well, I don't know exactly. They're all going to be downtown on Main Street because they're looking for color. Something that may create some color interest downtown. Because so far we know nothing's really been to. So we made a small investment in some containers and um they've been done well but that they it was just a test to just see and plus it was an expensive initial test so um how much are bulbs i don't know i don't know they're expensive are they yeah i don't know i don't know exactly but i asked lacy if she'd like us to potentially sort of like

help in some way and she thought she said that'd be great if we felt like it but she's not requiring anything you know what i mean so when when we the garden club gave us the grant to do the work on the bank there at the canc depot and put in the daffodil bulbs there we they gave us the money we threw money in the bulbs cost about 75 cents a piece and we had we had done like twelve hundred dollars yeah we did twelve twelve hundred dollars or so worth Now, you go back 10 or so years ago, the Career Center planted a bunch of daffodil bulbs in the tree pits all along Main Street, and they started to do pretty well, and then we had to redesign the tree pits and redo the electric in them and replace a bunch of the trees, so they all kind of disappeared. Yeah, they went away, so that's probably a good idea to do that. We'll have to... I guess thing do would be to find, get a little more definitive plan and then we can see if we were willing to throw in some cash on that. I don't see a reason why we shouldn't, but we should know more about it so we can make a decision.

Now that I know that we, it's something we potentially would like to invest in.

I think it's a possibility. We've done things like that before.

Sure. I kind of thought we probably had, so I asked her if she would like me to inquire.

Yes.

Excellent.

Good deal.

Super.

All right. I have America 250.

Yes, so tell me, please tell me about the tree we've already planted.

In the meadows at the Arrow Foundation Park, we have a swamp white oak that we put in this spring that is going to be our America 250 tree. Early in the year, I talk with Ralston Art Memorial. They make a a 12 by 14 granite marker to put at the tree. But then last time we talked a little bit about doing a great big rock. I haven't had a heck of a time finding someone that knows where big rocks are. We can get sandstone. but we need a rock, something so that Ralston can etch it and it can be there forever. I'm afraid sandstone would just degrade over time. So if you guys know anybody that has big rocks, because Ralston can't find any anywhere, where would we find big rock?

I'm not sure, but let me ask you this. So what is this in relationship to the America 250 heritage tree?

Well, the idea was to identify that tree with a marker, and we talked about maybe using a big rock as our marker instead of a granite plant.

Okay, because ohiohistory.org inquired to Olivia, who forwarded to me, that they wanted to know when our heritage tree event was going to be, and it was supposed to be in the spring. Oh, it was?

No one's told me anything.

It's okay. No, it's fine. They moved it to the fall. So that's the thing that I want to talk to you about. Because do we have more trees that we could call a heritage tree? Because wouldn't it seem good if we potentially planted one like at the Veterans Walk, like the park? We will plant trees there once that's all done. Okay. Okay.

If I might interject real quick, I think the heritage trees were a specific tree that came from the state. Am I wrong? I think it was.

Well, in my conversation earlier in the year, it was going to be two-inch caliper swamp white oaks, and they were going to provide one to every community.

Yes.

But that was my conversation in the spring, and I haven't had a conversation with anybody since then.

Okay. So we planted our own tree. We planted our own tree that we purchased. We have not planted or have plans for any heritage trees, which are actually coming from a specific stock to be donated to us.

Okay. So apparently we were going to be July 3rd for this heritage tree event, and now our time frame is somewhere September through early November. So why don't... And I think it would be great to have it near our new veterans park and the veterans walkway and all of that. But that doesn't mean I'm the boss, right? I just think it would be cool. So we're having a meeting on that on July 8th. What do you want me to, so why don't we talk about it after and just clarify all of this? Okay, Quentin, thanks for that, Quentin.

There was also an event associated with the Veterans Walk on Veterans Day weekend. So that weekend in November, which I believe is the 13th and 14th. So there's already going to be an event there. So maybe it's a good, just do that at the same time.

Awesome. Very good. I'm glad we got something going on that. Cause it's kind of just sat there.

Yeah. Well, I, you know, I don't know anything about this heritage tree lady. So I just got forwarded this email and I was like, okay, well we'll figure this out.

Well, they told me we were going to get a tree, and it's like, well, we already kind of had a plan to plant trees, so we just did it.

All right. Well, you and I will figure out how I'm going to respond to this lady so we can get all our trees set up.

Hey, go back to your marker on the 250 tree. Shouldn't it have been done before this weekend?

We don't have the tree in. Well, we have the tree in that we intended to, but I don't know. I want options. That's why I'm trying to find a big rock. So you have a big rock with everything cut into it?

With all that stuff you have in your backyard, don't you have a big rock?

Oh, I do. You can find bigger. Not as big as you want. But, no, I mean, didn't they give us a tree with the intentions?

We don't have the tree yet.

Okay. So we didn't drop the ball, good.

No, we haven't dropped any ball, buddy boy.

Buddy boy?

No way. We're trying.

Well, I thought that, yeah, it's life force this weekend. Okay.

We just juggled a lot of stuff, that's all. Okay. Okay. Good. We'll move ahead on that one then. I like that. I've got Bee City in here. Do you want to talk about Bee City?

Sure. So coming up next Wednesday, the 8th, is that Wednesday? It'll be Wednesday. There's going to be a screening of a film called The Little Things That Rule the World, and that's going to be at the Lowry Center Theater. If you don't know what the Lowry Center is, that's the CAC, the Kenyon Athletic Center. So we're going to screen that there. There's also going to be, I think, at least 100, maybe a couple hundred high school age kids there that are attending a camp currently at Kenyon that will be going to that screening and watching that. And probably all the pollinator nuts in the area will be there as well. The mayor is going to give a little bit of talk about what you know, it means to us in the city. And then I think we're going to have a panel kind of Q&A afterward with some people who have done stuff in the area like that to just talk about the importance of native pollinators. So that's coming up next Wednesday on the 8th. I believe it's 6 o'clock. There's a flyer out there on Facebook. So 6 to 8. That's at the Kenyon Athletic Center. There's a theater in there apparently. I didn't know that. So I'll be interested to see what that looks like. Um, we'll be at first Friday this week, even though I have the day off, uh, the pollinators don't take a day off, so I can't take a day off for them. And we're conveniently situated right next to the Knox County beekeepers. Um, at least we were last month. I believe we are again this month. So look for the line of big yellow tents and that's your, your key to know where to go. Just like the pollinators look for the visual cues. You got to look for that to find us. Um, and we'll be out there handing out seeds, seed packets, um, Um, per the usual, we did something kind of weird recently. So the infiltration basin at the salt barn, um, there were some issues with it initially when it was constructed. Um, and so they, we made some changes that fixed it and then we seeded it in June, which is a very unusual thing to do, but we put a bunch of, um, wild rye in it. So like annual rye grass, and we also put a bunch of partridge pea in it. And I was out there, I was out there today, I didn't take a good look, but I was out there last week and surprisingly because of the odd rain we've had this month, there's actually, it's mostly coming up. So I'd say probably close to 75% of the area, the seed stuck, the saw struck, stuck and the ryegrass is coming up and holding the rest of the seed in place. And if you get down real close and look, you can see a little partridge piece coming up too. So it actually worked somehow. I think we'll probably go back this fall and seed some more just to take care of the bare spots. And just in case any of the smaller seed washed away down into the bottom of the basin. But that was... oddly successful. If you look at the beach tree ditch too, you'll see, I haven't got up close to see, it looks like either some black eyed Susan or some coreopsis growing. So it's not all over the place, but if you will see these yellow flowers growing around there. So there's some stuff going on there too. And then I'll let Zane talk about the quotes that we have, the proposals we have and how we're moving forward with those.

question in the fall we cut down that that on beach street we cut all that um big stuff what what was that again uh that was um because we it was something we intentionally planted beggar's tick maybe i think is what it was called because it's coming in real well again this year too oh yeah yeah that stuff is hardy we used a hedge trimmer to cut it yeah a weed eater wouldn't even touch

And loppers. That was the other way.

Loppers and edge trimmer to get it cut down. It was like, man. Does it need to be cut every year?

Well, it certainly wouldn't hurt to help the other things come in. We like, you know, it's great that something's coming in, but we want to try to promote or we want to... What's... try to avoid monoculture of any kind. So Canada goldenrod is a good example of a native plant that we often eradicate because when it gets into an area, it'll just really take away everything else. And there's a lot of native plants that are very, they have very specific symbiotic relationships with native pollinators. So milkweed with MONARCHS IS THE CLASSIC EXAMPLE OF THAT, RIGHT? ANOTHER GOOD ONE IS PAU-PAWS WITH I THINK IT'S THE ZEBRA SWALLOWTALE BUTTERFLY AND THERE'S PROBABLY A LOT MORE WE DON'T KNOW ABOUT JUST BECAUSE THERE'S LIKE SO MANY POLLINATORS, RIGHT? SO WE WANT TO TRY TO PROMOTE BIODIVERSITY AND EVEN THOUGH IT'S A PRETTY PLANT, I THOUGHT WITH THE FLOWERS WHEN THEY CAME UP JUST

I think so.

Yeah, I think we'd probably order a custom seed mix without that in there. Or maybe just a lot less of it.

It's hardy.

Yeah, Quinn had alluded to, uh, the quotes that we had gotten. So we had met with Ohio native concepts. It's a company out of Columbus area that focuses on kind of pollinator habitats and landscaping. We met with them a couple months back, got some quotes to rehab sites we have around town. to eliminate some wet areas, recreationally mowed areas, prairie pocket we have at Blackjack Wetlands. They submitted quotes and we have moved forward with two of them, one at Blackjack Wetlands. There is a meadow prairie on the eastern portion of that property. where we want to remove invasive species, kind of dethatch some of the lying vegetation that's in there. There's a lot of dog man that grows up and lays in there and, and some, some other grasses and things. So we want to go in there, get that project moving forward as part of the greater blackjack wetland. boardwalk restoration that we have going on, as well as over at the cemetery. We were approached by PB&L, Public Buildings and Lands. They have an area on the northeast side of the property that lies really wet, and it's really hard to mow. John Alberts had expressed interest in maybe converting that into a low-mow, no-mow area, kind of help with maintenance costs. We agreed. We think that's great. So we're going to try and convert that into... into a, uh, a meadow, you know, go in there, treat the turf grass, get it, the site ready, get native seeds in there. And so we reached out to them. They submitted their quotes. We reached back out last week wanting to proceed and are just waiting confirmation and scheduling from them.

Also part of that was the meadows at the arrow foundation park. 15 acres there. We had made, got everybody's blessing and we were gonna go ahead and kill all the grass and plant a low or no mow grass. It grows about six inches tall. Doesn't have to be mowed anytime, ever. Can be mowed, it'll still grow back. And so that way, instead of mowing that 28 times a year, we're maybe only mowing it once. What's it called? It's called a no mow or low mow.

Have you done that yet?

Well, it was part of the original plan, but we have a group of 800 bicyclers coming in this fall, and they're going to camp in that area. So we decided it was better not to kill all the grass and have bare dirt and potentially mud if it rained. The conversation is if they want to come back next year, we would move the campsite over to behind the lakes there at the First Knox Pavilion so we could go ahead and take care of that next year. So that'll be a project we work on next year. And part of that, we also, there was a small wooded lot in the back that was very overgrown, tons of invasives, and we got the invasives cleaned out of that, and Zane's been working but we'll be working to keep those invasives down so they don't come back. There's quite a few trees in there that are not in good shape that will eventually come out and it will be more of an open wooded area in the grass area. So it'll be more inviting for use. You can come in and sit in the woods and do things. Hopefully good things like have lunch and stuff. That was part of that. It's not happening this year.

I HAVE ONE LAST THING ON B CITY. SO OVER THE PAST FEW YEARS WE'VE PLANTED SEVERAL TREES, NOT AS MANY AS TREE CITY, BUT A FEW HUNDRED PROBABLY, ALL WITH VOLUNTEER LABOR, AND WE'RE NOTICING THAT WITHOUT PROPER PROTECTION THOSE TREES BECOME DEER FOOD PRETTY QUICK, ESPECIALLY IN THE WOODS WHERE NOBODY'S MONITORING THEM. SO WE WOULD LIKE TO WORK WITH THE SHADE TREE COMMISSION TO PURCHASE SOME Um, just, I think we're just thinking four foot high fencing for that. So just the rolls, four foot high fence, because most of what we plant is pretty small. It's usually a foot or two tall at most coming in like one gallon pots or at most a two gallon pot usually. Um, and then just some wooden stakes because it's, uh, getting kind of FRUSTRATING TO PLANT THESE TREES AND THEN COME BACK AND SEE THEM SLOWLY. THE SUCCESS RATE ISN'T JUST WHAT WE WANT. MOST OF THEM ARE DONATED. I DON'T THINK WE'VE REALLY BOUGHT ANY TREES. THEY'VE ALL BEEN DONATED. BUT IT'S STILL, TO WASTE THAT TREE AND THE EFFORT THAT WE PUT INTO PLANTING IT, WE'D APPRECIATE IT. AND THEN OBVIOUSLY WHEN WE'RE DONE WITH THE CAGES, SHAPE TREE COULD USE THEM FOR THEIR PROJECTS AS WELL.

Yeah, so if you go up into the arboretum up behind the Delano field up in there, you'll see that those are, they're about to spin around four foot tall.

And that's what we're looking for?

That's what we'll be, that's what he's talking about.

Okay.

And we have quite a few of them in there. The trees are big enough now to remove those, so that would be a good start on that.

We did have some initially that we got from the parks department when we planted a lot of trees out there where the encampment was that had burnt down. There was a weird situation there where we showed up one day And all of the cages had been removed and the T-posts as well pulled out and the cages were disconnected from the T-posts and laid out flat. And then we're like, well, this is weird. We'll have to come back and put those on later on because at that point it had kind of grown up. So we couldn't really see the trees well anyway. So we're going to wait till the fall. And then another time we came back and they were all gone. So somebody stole the cages for whatever reason. I don't think we've ever had that happen before. So I'm hoping that was just a one-off. But we had about, I think, 20 cages or so that we got from the parks department that just disappeared.

That's frustrating.

Find out who it was and have them come back and help us solve it if they were that good about taking them apart.

It's a lot of work. Those T-posts are heavy. And it's not easy dragging the fencing through the grass. So they really wanted it for some reason.

All right. That's good for Tree City. So I've got new business here. I got the West End Tree Nursery, but I wanted to talk to Randy a little bit, find out how things are going.

So far so good. We're trying to keep up with everything. Keeping them busy. Yeah, they stay busy.

Brian keeps putting them in the ground.

Yeah.

That's good. And the trucks working? Well, we got no maintenance issues, things are happening. Shouldn't say it out loud, right?

We had a little bit of an issue, but we seem to go straight down on that new motor. bunch of gas and oil. carburetor stuck or what? So we got it cleaned up and it's working. Okay, very good. And then, um, you were able to get the fittings needed so you have them on the shelf if you need them again yeah yep uh had a handle break last week and i just switched it around put a ball valve on with a short hose but i see how they like it which one they like better because i think sometimes the way the handle gets broken they get tired of holding it so they stick a rock in there they're just plastics oh okay I'm not saying that's how I got broke, but they get drug around.

Yeah, I'm sure they get drug around.

Yeah.

Yeah, getting the hose wound up and all. Very good.

Yeah, they're doing great.

Very good. And then we have them through the end of August. Probably beginning, middle of August. First of August.

Yeah. First of August. I know with one and the other, real short after that, so...

I've mentioned to Madison that she would come out and do an interview or highlight or something and get some publicity on what they're doing. And let it be known that we need some replacements. But I'm not sure how far she's gotten on that. We just talked about it a couple times in one of the meetings. And I talked to her about it before. So I'll bring that back up next time I'm around there.

I have one that's a seasonal employee that possibly can do it if he's still around. So we'll have to wait and see.

You're working them too darn hard.

You've got to be a work to work, too.

You've got to show up, yeah. Showing up helps, that's for sure. All right. Along these lines, the Cocosin Gap Trail, Randy Cronk got a hold of Brian. Did you plant the trees for him or you just Yeah, you plant Brian planted some 30 trees along the cozy gap trail. And in the years past, when we've worked with them, we put water bags out so they trees got water. So they want to know, could they have 30 water bags? So the I haven't had a conversation with Randy yet, but my conversation through Brian and Randy is that we gave we let them have 30 water bags. They're going to replace them. So that way they can their investment doesn't go down the tubes because it's not being watered. And we were fortunate right now. We're ahead on water bags because we bought enough to be, to have a few extras, even with all the trees, the Brian's plant.

So just so if you ever hear anything about a water bag, it could go as a gap trail.

That's what it's all about. We, we gave them to them. They're going to replace them for us.

Anything else going on with the parks is water bar bags, hard to find or. Why did they?

We buy them regularly. They're not inexpensive.

Like why didn't they go to Amazon or something, get their own water bags? My question.

Well, I think it was a matter of we got trees in the ground and we don't have a bag. I wasn't in on that.

Was that the trees that were planted in honor of Karen, right?

Can you answer that? Were they? Last question.

Were those the trees for the park district that were in honor of Mrs. Wright, Karen Wright? No. No, they just planted a whole bunch of trees in her honor. And I was wondering if those were the trees.

OK. They didn't know they didn't know.

And then they'll have 31 bags for future projects. Because they do last more than a season if they're taken care of, if they aren't hit with a weed eater and lawn mower, things like that. I wanted to make sure if you had anything, you got a chance to say it.

I think we're good right now. First of August, I'm not sure. Dang it.

That's way too quick. That's coming way too fast.

It's true. Tomorrow's July 1st. I know. It's astounding. I know. How fast time goes. Yeah.

all right so the west end tree nursery last month we had talked about getting together on the last saturday and getting that prepared for the sequoia trees with the rain we had during the week rain on friday and then the forecast was thunderstorms on saturday renting the equipment to poke the holes and then do all the work we thought it didn't make sense to be out in the rain doing that so i sent everybody sent you all a text and said we we dropped it so This would be the time to look everybody look at their calendar and let's see we can find another date that might work Yeah, I know For me it would be late in the month 18th and 15th

I can do either one of those at this point.

Get your calendar out, Russ.

I do 18th, I'm booked, 25th, I'm available.

You're good on 25th? 18, I'm good, 25th, I'm not. You said you have to run your own. Quentin, Zane, anybody? I need to make sure I get that before you leave today.

I prefer not the 18th.

25th.

Yeah, I'm planning to get Tampa done again, so 25th.

That works in your world, too?

As far as I know, it's like this.

All right, so we're going to plan on the 25th of July.

9 o'clock.

9 a.m. It's right off of Adams Street. It's a little plot the city owns. It's got houses on two sides, the Farmer's Exchange on the east side and the AEP easement on the south side. So it's landlocked in there. So it's right in the heart of the city, but it's out of the way.

All right. Maybe you could send us a text message with, like, a physical address, as close as we can to a physical address.

You can find that, can't you? Yeah.

It doesn't have a physical address, but I can get you there.

We can send you a map.

It's Adams and Gambier?

No, it's in between. Yeah. It's on Adams, south of Gambier.

It's close to Gambier than it is to Park Avenue Park.

It's right in between Arch and Gambier on Adams Street on the east side.

All right. Got that. So under other, we're good. Going through what we are anticipating planting for the fall, looking at fall planting. We've got a couple of churches and living center that are interested in trees. We've got the industrial park. We've got Martinsburg Road. Habitat for Humanity houses on Columbus Road. He did get back with me. All those houses are either been sold or in contract.

So he's going to work with the homeowners or new homeowners and see where we can go with getting trees in there.

But the goal, they put in 12, I believe. So the goal was to get get a tree or two on each lot with their new home martinsburg road you took out 17 so we'll probably be replacing 17. the career center would like to have six trees so we'll add that into there there so we're we're coming hitting 300 trees pretty close with that list well actually more than 300. Which churches are those?

The Baptist Church on Edgewood and Gambier and then LifePoint Church on Division Mount Vernon Avenue.

So the fairgrounds is also potentially interested in a few trees out there too. But I've got contacts but I haven't made an appointment on that yet. When I get a chance we'll make an appointment for that. So when we did our targeting Two years ago, we mailed everybody a letter saying we're targeting your neighborhood and gave them a postcard. And we got a really good response. Last year, we mailed them a thing that said use a QR code or call, and we didn't get much of a response. So I think it would be a good idea, everybody has to decide, to target the north side of the West End, north of High Street in the West End, and target that area again this year and see if we can get a few more trees in that area because we went from almost 100 on the south side to like what was your number 17 or 40 okay so we got 40 but i think we could do more and i think this time we won't really only did we went to riverside park i believe where we cut it off was it walnut or no not walnut was it ridgewood no right what's the one that runs right there along the dyke to the furthest north by the rainwood greenwood green lawn greenwood greenwood we kind of stopped there i think it'd be good to go further north and get the um their area all the way up to the bmv tilton avenue and get that area too the west side of sandusky street part of the qr code here it

it wasn't on that site well no we did we did right on sandusky because of the sidewalk work we had reached out to them separate from the west end but we did reach out to them so i think i hit our demographic a little better i think we need to do

I think we need to do both. It's easy to add a QR code to the postcard. So the idea was it would save money because having a pre-stamped postcard costs extra, obviously, and just sending a letter was cheaper, basically half the cost. But I think that you're going to see some people of a particular demographic that would only do a QR code, some people that would only mail it in.

Yes, so that was kind of the, in our conversation about where trees are going and what we're doing, that was kind of what we were thinking. I wanted to bring that up and get some opinions.

Yes, no, like it, want to do something different?

Sounds reasonable? Yep.

I think adding, I think putting the QR code on a postcard is the way to go.

Okay. We'll work on a draft on that. here in the next month or so. If anyone doesn't have anything else to do, you can do that.

We have interns.

All right. So that's kind of where I am with my list of things. Does anybody else have anything else they'd like to talk about, bring up, concerns, questions, opinions, areas you think we should work on?

I was running some numbers earlier. I counted 274 trees we've got in already or so far.

The plant?

So far this year? How many? 274 out of 474. So we have another 200 or so to go, which is great.

I don't think he has the fairgrounds or habitat on there or... No, no, that's just our projects. It's not just the things that we've kind of started working on already.

Well, that's what's already been planted.

Oh, yeah. Not planned.

Yeah. Planted. Yes.

Yeah. 270 of the 470. Yeah, it's about 500.

Yeah.

About halfway done planting.

No pressure, Brian.

These young guys don't like working in this heat.

This is a tough week. It's going to be a tough week.

Yeah. You're going to lose all this help.

Yeah. Crazy.

They will. Yeah. All right. We're good? Leave me alone.

I have a question. What do you got? It's not important, but opposite Founders Hall on Vine near Gay, it looks like there were old tree wells there. The sidewalk is kind of like the ceramic brick, but it looks like it had tree wells, but there are no trees.

Right, that's the house with the big stone wall? Yeah. Yes, there were trees in there years ago.

Is there a reason it's a problem? And also on Vine Street on the opposite side of Main, opposite the bank drive-through it's like there are some tree wells there but no trees like in front of the barber shop yeah and kind of where near where they closed in the entrance to the parking that was online well let's get them on the list let's work on it i didn't know if there was some reason like you put them there and they didn't make it and it's a bad spotter and i don't drive that way so i don't see

For the sidewalk on Vine Street, we would probably want to redo the sidewalk before you planted trees, put like a concrete border around it, because the sidewalk's not in very great condition there. And we have a better way of doing those now than just laying them on the dirt.

So that's on the west side of Main Street, the one by Gay?

Yeah, it's on the north side of Vine Street near Gay.

Oh, those are the ones you

Those bricks, definitely. Before you plant a tree there, because I wouldn't want to, you know, 10 years from now, if we go to do it, we have to undercut where the bricks are. Essentially, we pour a concrete sidewalk underneath, put leveling sand, and then use the bricks as kind of the wearing surface for the sidewalk. And so I wouldn't want to cut through the roots of the tree.

Is that on the schedule any time?

It's not, but if you wanted to plant the trees, that's something we could look into scheduling and probably look into... PARTNERING WITH THE HOMEOWNER THERE BECAUSE IT'S GOING TO COST MORE THAN A TYPICAL SIDEWALK. SO WE WOULD PROBABLY APPROACH THEM AND SAY, HEY, DO YOU WANT TO KEEP THESE BEAUTIFUL BRICK SIDEWALKS? IF SO, LET'S MAKE A DEAL.

Off North Main, I always get these tree sketches, I think it's Hamtramck, the one going down over the hill, but it's between North Main and Mulberry. One of my trees got put in on the side there, and the lady already had one, and those trees are gone. I think I asked about this last month. They wiped it out. Yeah, does she get a new tree put in and a new... A new TCP tree and a new tree for the one that was hers already along there. I'm surprised I haven't gotten that.

It would be a replacement, right?

What were the trees? Why were they removed?

Because they have the street unbricked. It's the construction.

The construction area.

Where was the house again? I thought you said it was on Main and...

Off North Main, her house faces North Main, and there's that one colonial house in the corner of the Living Center parking lot. It's the side street between there. I always forget. Is that Hamtramck? Yes.

Hamtramck, yeah.

So she got two trees in front that are fine, seemingly, and one on the side, and she had one on the side, and they are nowhere to be seen. So I'm just wondering what happens when that is done.

Yeah, we could replace them. I wasn't aware that those trees were coming out.

somewhere to save them. I don't see them anywhere. I didn't really, like, go in her yard, but.

Were they recently planted trees? Like, they were within a couple years? Yeah.

Yeah, we could replace those.

Yeah, I don't know why those came out. Didn't know about it.

They are done with Burgess and Ham training. We will go through there and try to plant some contracts.

Like I said, I'm surprised we didn't get it. It's gaining weight now. Yes. But, yeah.

Well, when they come in and tear up the street like that, you expect things to happen. Bigger complaints. Yeah. Yeah, bigger complaints. Okay. Well, that's it. I would entertain a motion to adjourn.

So moved. Yep.

I can't hear, so.

Make a motion to adjourn.

I'll second.

All right. Thank you. Thank you, everybody.