Tree Board - Regular Meeting

Welcome to the December meeting of the Tree Board. Let's stand for the pledge of allegiance of the flag. Attendant, you got that count going? Can't. Alright. We'll pass on the attendance. Has everybody had a chance to read the minutes of previous meeting?

Yes. Any

additions or corrections?

Yes. Turning to them right now. Just one moment. Let me find it. Okay. On the Section five, Staff Updates, recent plantings and status updates, where Will had mentioned some of those. The very last one, information regarding the upcoming planting for National Public Lands Day. I just think he actually said it slightly differently. I think you mentioned Wellington Garden Club with that tree planting. Am I correct?

Well, we do.

Right. So I think the wording should be corrected this way, possibly, saying what he said. Information regarding the tree planting in partnership with the Wellington Garden Club on National Public Lands Day.

I got an update

of the Do you want me to repeat that? Yes. You got it? Okay.

Other additions or corrections?

I wanted to suggest I know that where it's the the next bullet, I wanna say, Roman numeral six, under new business, Flower Awards. It says, Tree Board discussed different ways to advertise the awards and increase engagement in Wellington. We such as I wanna add these words. Such as inclusion in the town crier. And we asked for it to basically included in the newsletter, in the city communications newsletter that went out.

Yes.

So we also discussed that. So but I think it should be a little more specific in how it says we we discussed different ways to advertise the awards and increase engagement, such as inclusion in the town crier and in the monthly village newsletter digital newsletter. Should we put digital newsletter? Village

Website or digital newsletter.

Website, which, that's actually good. Website and digital newsletter.

You're fine. Okay. You're done? Yeah. Kathy might have something

to add. Yes. Just to add to your edit there. I specifically volunteered if you want to point me out, that's fine. I specifically volunteered to do a write up article for the town crier, if you recall that.

Do

you remember it? And I did do it, by the way. But if you'd like, you can include that or or not. It doesn't Yes.

You said that. You would do a write up about it in the Yes. The in the town crier.

To submit to the town crier

an article. So we're gonna put board member

Kathy Sienna.

Mhmm. Kathy

Sienna offered Volunteered or Or volunteered. Yeah.

Volunteered to do a write up for the town crier.

Right. Okay. Perfect.

Any other additions or corrections? Yep. Have a motion to approve the minutes as corrected.

Motion to approve the minutes as corrected. Second.

All in favor?

Aye. Okay.

Moving on. Staff updates. Alright.

Well, we've got a few things here. While we're on that topic of the town crier, I think that went to our communications department, your write up did, for approval.

Yeah. I was going to mention that.

Was gonna

bring That's up gone

to the article and talk about it for time.

So and the our website is going to have the Flower Award on the banner. And I think that when did you say that goes up tomorrow? It's actually It's up now? Okay. Oh, So that should be up now.

That's exciting. Okay.

So if you bring up the website, the banner that goes across the bottom should have that flower award on it now.

Excellent. That's great. Oh, that's a good idea.

So We'll take a look at that. If you can you guys see that on your screens?

Mhmm.

Okay.

Beautiful. Oh, really nice. Wonderful.

Oh, that's so nice.

It's beautiful.

Nice.

Okay. That's nice. Good.

Excellent work. Now we're getting a little more coverage of the Flower Award.

So shall I add to that now about the article? Or did you did they get it?

I mean,

I guess Let's wait till we get to that.

So you

wait to where?

The comment section

or Okay, sure.

I was gonna mention it under Flower Award nominations.

I guess it could be. You could fall into that too. Okay. So we had do you guys have the spreadsheets for the tree planting? Yeah. Here. She can bring it up on the computer. We did pretty good last year on our plantings. 2,412 trees planted. Two ninety eight of those were with grant funding. And 1,100 of those were our planting in with the Garden Club in September. Did the public lands day planting 1,100. So brought our total up to twenty four twelve this year, which was good. Better than last year's. Currently, the project's going on.

We have the new aquatic center that's being landscaped now. They're bringing in a lot of the material and planting a lot of the trees in landscape now. So it's looking pretty good. A lot of native stuff.

All good.

Pretty good selection of trees. Red maples and gumbos and stuff. And it looks it looks nice. They should have that Where

finished that scheduled to be done?

I think they're trying to open that the first of the year but they're scrambling to get it done.

Yeah. Saw I saw a flyer that it's a grand opening celebration which is really nice. It's January, early January.

Early January. Yeah. That's the Is there

a plan for the property over here? Which one? The one where the pool is. You said aquatics?

I haven't seen anything. I don't know what they're gonna do with that to the old the old aquatic center. I'm not sure what's what's gonna happen with that yet.

They can always fill it in like they did one off of Brookdale.

Yeah. I think they they need more parking over there, so maybe a parking garage, but we'll have to see.

Oh, garage.

That would

be Mhmm.

And then the second phase of the Big Blue Landscape Project, I saw the plans, they've been approved, they're getting ready to start on that. It's not very extensive, just a few beds, they're adding in some irrigation. The big one will be the third phase, which is that portion South of Wellington Trace towards South Shore.

Oh, right. Right.

That that section Everybody's about It's much more costly because they're changing the roadways, adding medians. So there's more infrastructure work that's that's happening with that, which is why they chose to do that northern portion first.

Mhmm. Oh, that makes sense.

Looks really good, though.

It's coming along. We're we have to make some adjustments. But

The plants. Right?

Some of

the plants are overgrown and it's like

the Well, you're pulling out of some of the side streets, the streets are lower than

the

landscape. So the height of the material they put in is is a little too tall for the situation. Right. So we're gonna have to put in some different material is all. But we're we're gonna work on that here in the next couple couple weeks.

Excellent. That's good.

So coming out of Silver Bell and Barberry, it's it's hard to see when you look

Right. North. I saw. I saw it because it

It didn't look bad in the beginning, but then when the stuff starts to fill in and mature, it's it's a little too tall. So we've already pulled some of the stuff out, the Fakahatchee grass, but I'm gonna have to change a little more material just to make it the line of sight. Right. It's obscured kind a little bit, so.

Yeah, the grasses have gotten very I saw when I was there, was like, oh, these things have overgrown. But it's okay. But you know what, just use it. When you guys are removing my question is when you guys are removing those materials, are you re planning it somewhere else?

We try. I mean, we try and put stuff in, move stuff around, and we try to Well, save

that's yeah. That's a good idea. I mean

If we can. Yeah. Sometimes they don't come out very well.

It's it's often, especially with things like palms, it's often easy cheaper, actually, to buy a new one and put it in than it is to move one, depending on

the palms. If the stump if if it comes out in in good condition, we reuse it. Right. Sometimes it gets pretty

I'm talking like wire grass, though, not palms, you know.

I mean, small palms, small palms are easier, but the big palms it is, it's less, it's more cost

Depending on the species and its size and all that sort of thing, it is often much cheaper to simply replace it.

Yeah. With a with a new a new palm. That's more cost effective.

I've been down that road so many times. Yeah. And I hate

to cut them down and Yep. I've done it on many projects, and it's just when you run the numbers, it's a lot more cost effective to put new material in. Then what else do we have? I think that's Tree removals. Tree removals. That spreadsheet is updated. We've got a few on there. I got a couple more coming up. I've got a few oaks around town that have have died. Some of them have Ganoderma, some mushrooms on them.

I don't know if they were damaged. You know, we had those storms a couple years ago in the wind. I don't know if we had some breakage on the root or something along those lines. But you can kind of see it's on one side of the tree. And then I had a couple of live oaks that just had no sign of any disease. They just spontaneously turned brown.

They owned the the city properly.

Yeah. Yeah.

So Are they being so is the grass being sprayed?

No. These were in, like, parking areas. Okay. One of them at Village Park and then one of them over at our our office.

You know, sometimes you get bad material too.

Mean Well, were established. These are old these are old.

They've been there for a while.

I've seen some that have been there for a while and there were always nothing.

Yeah. Maybe the heat got them.

Well well, one of the things I've I've observed a couple of times in Florida is when you get, I won't call them flash floods because we don't have flash floods, but when you get excessive rain for longer periods of time than normal generally, you get rain shower once a week, but when you get five or six heavy rains in a week, that kind of thing, you can often throw trees off in their balance, and the next thing you know, they're heading downhill. I've seen that happen four or five times.

We had, like, a period of very dry, and then it was wet, and then it got dry again.

So Yeah. But I mean, when it got wet, it really got

wet. Yeah. We had a lot

of rain. I mean, when I'm emptying my pool three times a week

Yeah. Yeah. There was a period of time where we didn't get a lot of rain in one month. Right. It was about that time when it checked out. Maybe a couple of months after that. But anyway, there's a couple more removals we'll have to add to that probably for next year's, we'll get them pretty soon.

Will, can I ask you a question there on the Ganoderma part of what you were saying? You said that was in an oak tree?

Yeah. I think it's a secondary issue because there was some other injury to the tree that caused the Ganoderma usually doesn't attack live, vigorous hardwoods.

Okay. That's what I was wondering.

It was a secondary organism that comes in after something else has happened.

Uh-huh.

So I'm thinking we have a lot of pines on private property. They're starting to check out where that tornado went through just from root damage and all that. I expect that for the next couple of years that we'll lose a few a year over there in that path of that tornado. So but we've we've planted a bunch of trees with grant funding along the berm over there. We replaced a lot of our trees with that grant funding. I think we lost a little over 500 trees from public property that off our inventory that we had inventoried. And we're just we're trying to replace those. February, so we're a little better than halfway there.

Anything else going on? I think that about covers it. Okay. Let's move on to new business. Opening discussion on the Flower Award nominations. Kathy, you want to give your report now?

Sure. I think I have a nomination, but it's not prepared for today. I still have to get some more information from the person I'm thinking of nominating.

So

that's a good thing. I think it should be a good one. And secondly, just to add to what Will already said, I did write up a draft article for the town crier to submit, trying to encourage people to submit applications for our flower award. And I gave it to Michelle and Will, and they sent it to communications department to review, and then according to what they say.

What think do is going be the best timing for that, to send it out?

As soon as possible.

Yeah. Okay.

I'm already a little late doing it, and I'm sorry about that. I should have sent it in a lot sooner.

How often does the town crier

publish They their come out with an edition. I believe it's weekly, you can correct me. But they have only a digital edition, I think, every other time, and then a hard copy the other. I think it's something like that. They don't have a hard copy printout every edition.

No. I'm

pretty sure

it's

think

it's every other week.

I think it's something like that. Did you know you can subscribe to it? You can get the hard copy, which I get every week in my every other week in my mailbox. And then I also get the email about their new edition that's digital only. So you can I suggest that you it's really it's a very good local newspaper?

I've seen the hard copy. I didn't know they had a digital

They do, yes. So you're missing that week of information where you don't get the hard copy.

I

have an addition. Sure. I actually, on our last meeting, I said that I would contact the Greater Wellington Chamber of Commerce, because one of our categories is businesses for the Flower Awards. And I thought it was important that we get some nominations from businesses. So I did I was able to get ahold of somebody from the Greater Arlington Chamber of Commerce and they are actually gonna do a write up next week and they're gonna send it out to all their members, their business members that would qualify pretty much for this flower award.

So there's interest there also. So that's a good thing. The other thing I wanted to suggest is so that will take care of business category. The other thing I wanted to ask, is it possible you know, I think there's gonna be a lot of people in Wellington that will be at the grand opening of the aquatic center and also at the I think is it the celebration of the amphitheater I saw online? I think that's I wanna say is it January? Whatever is

the second year anniversary. Thirtieth anniversary celebration.

Anniversary celebration. Yes. So either one of those. Maybe the anniversary celebration would be better Mhmm. Because the deadline for the applications is February. Correct? So is it possible for us to give out applications at that event or have a table or be someone to be able to have applications to give out to residents for the Flower Award at that event?

It's probably possible.

Because I think it would be smart to do that. There's a lot of residents that are going be at that event. We can give out the applications for the Flower Award there. And I think it would generate a lot of interest and more nominations.

Let me see what I can come up with.

You have May I add to that? Well,

I believe so. They're

gonna Are have there to other vendors and things like that Or

Yeah. It's it's gonna be similar to a lot of the events they have.

Okay.

Yeah. Then it wouldn't appropriate. Wellington and have an event without a tent.

Yeah. Right. Will they

There'll definitely be tents and all that stuff. I'll have to see if there's one specific one I can post something at or put put something with the flower.

One of

us could even go and just give it

to about banning it, let us know.

Yeah, we can probably do that. We can probably work something out. Let me just let me get the layout and see, you know, where everything's gonna be and we'll come up with something.

Okay. That sounds good.

And may I? To add to that also, for the, maybe the people that want to just snap a picture of it and not take hard copies and save the paper, you could have a stand.

QR code.

You know, trifold, a stand and make a printout, a big printout, color printout.

With the QR code and

the link to it and everything. And then those that want to take a picture of it could do that. It'd be a bigger, you know, visual for people to see. Can you

handle the QR code?

I can handle that. Yeah. We can have something made up with the poster board and a little display.

Yeah. That's a good idea.

We can

put it somewhere at the Okay. At the function. Yeah.

Did we ever discuss, like, properties that are in gated community? I know we kinda did, but not really. We're not you know, mean, there was a whole thing with that.

The thing about that is it needs to be visual to everybody. And when you're inside the gated community, it's not visual to everybody. That's been the requirement so far.

But still, I still think it's visible to those, all those people in that community. Just like most of the homes that are landscaped, they're visible to the people that live in their community, whether it's gated or not. So I would say it should be open as long as we can get in to view the property to, you know,

would We'll have to be change the rules then.

There was nothing in it that, I don't think there's anything in the rules, John, that forbids gated communities, per se.

Well, what I was thinking is this. I I had a thought today, and it was about could, like, let's say we can't, you know, the problem is accessing. How how are we gonna have access to the to the house to be able to judge it? Right? That would that's pretty much the main issue.

Right? Yeah. So so in order to get rid of that, to resolve that, couldn't we have a city liaison just go there and take current pictures? And then we just show it like you see how we're seeing this on the screen? Can't we just see those those like, if there are residents that are in gated communities that wanna submit their their wanna wanna do a submission for our flower award, Couldn't we have a city liaison take photos of those properties in gated communities and we just look at them in our in our meeting?

And we do or they're sent to us by email, similarly how we have the other ones the other nominations sent to us? I think that would eliminate the problem of us having to access gated communities if we send a city liaison over there. We would have to vote on that? I mean, how would that work, Will?

We need to inspect it because I've you can take pictures that look really good. When you drive by, it doesn't. We've had a couple of them in the past that I've seen that look really, really good in the pictures because they get close in on things that are prominent. But when you drive by, the rest of the yard is junk. They're not maintaining it.

Well, I mean, maybe what we could do is then, like, if you prefer prefer to to drive drive by, by but I mean, I'd be fine with a pic like if the city liaison took a picture?

Right. But what I'm concerned about is this. Let's say we got some really great pictures and we give it an award. And then somebody drives by and it's not been maintained. It's not just the picture of the pretty tree, but the grasses, the overall view of the it would have to be an extensive interview, so to speak, a picture. I mean, it almost ought to be like a house walk through that people do, where you see the whole yard, you see everything you can see from the street. Just One

of the categories is overall appearance. It's kind of hard to judge One

of the categories is overall appearance. And we found we've run into in fact, there was one last year that had some really nice features, but the overall maintenance of the property in general in the time frame it was supposed to be judged in was sloppy.

Oh, yeah. I remember that property. But I never went you know, I saw a picture of it.

Yeah.

So to me, I mean, we're not gonna be able to monitor every week of the properties anyway.

Well, I'm not suggesting that. I'm suggesting that when we look at it, it needs to look presentable.

I agree. I definitely agree with that. You know? But As

you were saying, the first award criteria for evaluation on our I have a printout of the application in the description is curb appeal, free of trash and debris, 10 points for that. So it would be maybe a little more difficult if you just take a picture of the trees. You gotta get the whole the whole picture, really. The curb appeal and no garbage cans laying around with that is part of the Yeah. Evaluation. So you somehow have to make sure you get that. But I I agree with John that and also, how old is the picture? You don't know how old the is.

Well, if the city liaison is going out, they're going out in January and taking a picture. If the person submits their application, they're gonna go out before they submit the nomination to So it's gonna be a recent photo.

Well, should be.

Yeah. Now, like the other ones. As far as trash and things like that, you would see it on a wide angle photo. If there's trash all over the yard, you'd be able to see that clearly.

Then the other difficulty may be in identifying the native trees without Lisa can attest to this, may be a little difficult in a photo, a small photo, to identify how much percentage. That's item two on the evaluation, incorporate a minimum of 50% native landscaping. That's one of the biggest, that's 25 points for that. But then the other thing I was thinking is, you know, your suggestion of getting a liaison. Did you mean somebody on the tree board or not on the tree board?

No, a city liaison.

Then what we're doing is we're giving kind of our responsibility. This is our award, the tree, I think it is. Yeah. Responsibility for the tree board. So then we're giving our responsibility over to village person. Now they have another someone. Who's that someone going to be that will take on what maybe we should be doing, I think?

Well, can have it. I mean, I can go out there and take photos. Mean, with my background, I can take a photo of a native tree and not. And I I, know, I could take a wide angle photo if it's I mean, I think it would you know, it's easier a lot of times for a city liaison to be able to do that. But, I mean, I can do it or or somebody on our board can do it if if you guys would prefer that, if everyone would prefer someone on our board to do it, to not pass the responsibility of the city liaison.

I think the visual, as John suggested, think the visuals right in place is critical. But then, you know, that's up to the rest of the Tree Board members to

Well, I'll be honest discuss with you, Heather. I would not vote an approval of a property I could not see. You have all the pictures in the world. If I can't go see it, I'm not gonna I would not personally not vote. Now, the rest of the board, that's fine, but you will get a no vote for me.

Right. I mean, I'll tell you personally, I saw that picture last year that was submitted, and it was a mess. And I didn't need to physically go there to see that. You know, I saw the ladder in the tree and everything, and I said this is not a good representation

Right.

Of of

our city. I didn't I didn't need to physically So, go there to see I mean, I I don't know. I think it could go either way. You know, I obviously, I think a lot of board members have preference to go, but, you know, I mean, we're in a digital age too, you know. I I I would trust if if a if a person from our board went close to the time frame, it's a recent photo, you know, or or if a city liaison,

you know. Can I ask a question? Is it necessary for every single board member to view these properties, or can the people who, you know, really feel that it's important to see it in person go and see it in person, and the others who feel like they can make an evaluation by looking at a picture, let them. I mean, is there anything in our rules that say every single person has to view the property before we make a decision?

There are no rules that say that, that I'm aware of.

Could we I mean, to me, if you feel like you need to look at the property, and if the majority or at least 50% of the Board looks at the property in person, then if the others can make their judgment based on photos because the photos are going to be submitted with the application. So it doesn't you don't really even need to take more photos, because they're part of the application. Let that be, you know, let that be a way that we do it. That way we don't have to feel like if it's a gated community, especially if it's not a gated community, matter. Anybody can drive by at any single time.

But if it's a gated community, we don't want to have seven or eight people going to the gate at different times. We just do, you know, four people, or three people, and look at it. And you're going to know if it's a messy property, you're going to know that it's messy, you know, that it doesn't take seven people to make that determination.

Just

my thoughts, suggestion, whatever you guys think,

you know,

since there's no real guidelines for that.

I I like what you're saying. I mean, feel like if there's people that feel they need to physically see it in person, they should be able to do that. And then if they're like, for me, when some of them I can just see a picture, I'm fine with that. I just was thinking we need to expand the access to many of the residents that are in gated communities. That's really what my goal was here. I agree with you. Agree with you.

I don't disagree. But if property owner wants you to look at his property, he's got the ability to get you in.

Right. Or even the person who made the nomination, should that be a resident of that community, they also can give you access. Right.

Okay. Then how are we going keep just leave it how it is? We can judge by pictures or in person? Since there's

no Right now there's no rule whatsoever. But if I can't see it, I'm not gonna approve it.

Okay.

But I'm one vote of Well, have no vote now. So

Okay. Well,

do we need to take

a do we need to take a vote on this? Or can we just make it like a general statement?

Someone needs to make a motion if we're gonna do a vote.

But do we need do we need to have a vote is what I'm wondering.

Again, that's a decision. Someone's gotta decide whether we need to do that.

Okay. Well, I can

make a motion. I don't think it's necessary.

Oh, Okay.

That's

Right now, it's gray. And we obviously are not in agreement. As long as it's gray, it's gray.

Well, are we I do think we need to make a determination if there's gonna be a person designated in our board that's gonna take photos, you know, like Kathy suggested, or if it's gonna be a city liaison taking the photos for the people that aren't going there physically. I'm only thinking of gated communities, by the way. I was just thinking for it to be an easier access for the homeowner. It's easier for them just to allow one person to go there from the city and take photos and submit it to us than four people or what but you know what I mean? That that's what I was getting at with that. But I think we need to determine whether who's taking the photos if we if we do it digitally? If we leave it how it is, we don't know.

Right? I don't know why we have to have more photos. The photos are going to be included with the application.

I think the important thing would be to know when those photos were taken.

Right. Want we to make sure they're Something

current.

So we we either need a city liaison to go and take a recent photo because the concern is that maybe they're submitting an old photo.

Right? So that's gonna be that's gonna apply to every property, not just not just

Not just something that you need. Community property.

Okay.

You would need a you would need a you would need motion that would say only photos with their metadata attached are Acceptable. Acceptable.

What's that?

Metadata is if you pull up your on your phone photo on your iPhone and then swipe up.

It tells you the date.

The GPS location, the date Okay. The time Yeah.

Okay.

Of day, everything.

Are the residents gonna know metadata? It's like everything. They're gonna be like, what

is to make it super complicated.

Like, just just recent photo. It has to be a recent photo.

That many applications anyway.

It even it even shows you the direction you're facing.

GPS coordinates on your photos.

I was gonna say, I can't I didn't print out the Flower Award application or the

It's there. Note Michelle can bring it

up for you.

Can bring it

up, Michelle.

It's right there.

I'm looking to get past the, okay, there we go. Does it say anything on the

CAMPBELLARGE about

when the photos have to be taken? Because all I see is submit two to three high quality photos of landscapetree.

I probably should say current. Recent. Or recent. And

define that.

I would say within the last ninety days, or something like that, within the last three months, right? Or within the last sixty days.

If you get I'm sorry. May I ask

John?

John? May I speak?

Yes.

If you get too many particular details and rules for them, it might discourage them. We have to be careful that we don't get too detailed about things. It's got to be kind of general for the applicant not to be scared or say, oh, I'm not going to bother. They want too many details and too much. Yeah.

Just be careful about that. And also I wanted to just say in general about this award, it's one time a year. And I think it's good for us as tree board members to get out there in the village and look at what's in our village and what kind of I know we do that. We drive by it all the time. But to really go look at a specific property that we are going to recognize at the Earth Day event with an award. I think it's good for us to visually go check it out and see what we're honoring, rather than just a photo. How does that hurt us to do that?

I'm gonna ask that each tribal member make at least one nomination.

Mhmm.

Yeah. That's fair. If we're if we can't if we're not willing to do it, how can we expect the citizens to do it?

The problem the problem with with us making nominations is that you would have to abstain from voting if you were making that that nomination. Right? Like

I don't have a problem with that.

Right? Like, if you say, hey, my neighbor Chris has a great yard. I'm gonna nominate him.

Well, you

can nominate your own yard.

That's fine. Yeah.

That's fine.

Why would we have to abstain? Yeah. I don't see I don't

think you'd have to abstain. You might wanna abstain if it was your own property If

was your own property.

That you were nominating. But other than that

If you think it looks good, it looks good.

JAMES Right.

JAMES As far as you're concerned. I'm fine with that. No,

I think one of the things, too, about this is, like John, you said, getting out there in the community, or Cathy, Because, you know, we all have our routines and we drive down the same roads and go the same places, you know. And you miss out on a lot. And this is a way for you to get to know some of the neighborhoods and everything. And I remember there's been times when I've been going places to look at a property that was nominated and driven by some and said, oh, that's a good one. Remember that for another year type of thing.

I agree. I mean, I think we should go to the properties, but if we're not able to get to all of them, we should, you know, use the photos. I just think it's a matter of who's taking the photos. Like, Kathy's concern is, oh, are they taking a wide enough angle on the photo? Can we see garbage? That's why, I mean, we're asking you would run into that problem any year, though, previously, right?

No, if you go and do a visual check on the site, you're seeing the whole picture. And that's why I think it's better for us to go there and do that. That's kind of something I think we should do as Tree Board members. Not just, you know, what does that entail? That's not that big of a deal, I don't think, to go see a property.

No. I agree.

Unless we get 50 applications, then we can talk again. Yeah. I never know. That'll be different.

I never know. We're glad

to be wonderful, I guess. We'll have to put a limit.

If we get 50 applications, I have no problem in dividing it up. Yeah.

That's right.

You do the you three do these two, and you three do these three.

So is are we gonna get a, like like, as applications come into the city, will you let us know? Like, is there somebody at the city who can say, hey, you know

She does.

Michelle does?

Yeah. Michelle usually Okay. We have, like Yeah.

She sends

it to applications this year, you guys. You know? And then, I don't know.

That's generally, when they come in, she sends it to us.

Yeah. Okay. Alright.

So I mean, we've had them. We've received them in in December before. Alright.

Okay. So then can can we do so what about somebody from our board taking a photo? It sounds like you guys just wanna leave it alone, how it is.

Mhmm. Yeah.

Okay. I think so.

But it is open to people in gated communities. Correct?

Correct.

But it's

up to the owners pays basically, it sounds like it's up to the owners' responsibility to open their gate or whatever or to provide access to the tree board members to do the judging. Does that language need to be included in here? If you are submitting if you reside in a gated community, you know, that you would be responsible for providing access to tree board know?

Should there

be something?

Think it's a given, though. If if you submit an application, someone's gonna judge it. They're they're not judging the application. They're judging the property. And I don't think we need to address that.

Okay. Is how how are you getting contact with that person on the application?

It should be on the application. They'd be Reverend nominator is.

Okay. That's fine.

You know?

Okay. That's fine.

There's only one thing that does need to be modified, and then we'd have to vote on that, and then maybe we could move on, if possible. But landscapetree should be visible from street side of property. That is the thing. That's the wording we would need to modify if we are going to open it up to gated communities. Because, for example, where I live, can't see it from the street side. But I'd love to nominate my property. Not really. I

But you can see it from the street

in front of

your house.

JULIE You

can't see my property from any

JULIE Yeah, from the street that you live on. Well, That's true.

That's true.

You're right. But you have to get It doesn't have to be. You have to get through the gate.

Like on Forest Hill Boulevard, you know.

Visible from street side of property. So until, yeah. Okay. So that leaves it open

for It just gate rolls out the backyard.

Rules out the backyard.

That's Rules all out

the backyard.

Just front or whatever Front.

My backyard is the only part of my house.

Which also is a point. Should we really you know, narrow it just visible from the street side? Because you may have beautiful native plants in the back of the yard.

Yeah, but that gets to be a little complicated to, you know, for us to evaluate, you know, to judge. We don't want to have to be going back in their property like unless we did it from street side.

Coming from someone who's had to go into a million people's backyards because I trim all the trees behind your property.

Not a lot of things you

do. It is invasive to do that. And even when they know you're there, they don't

like Yeah. That's true.

Yeah. That's true.

Okay.

Lot of people

can have dogs. Nothing. There's too many variables.

I mean, we I'll be honest. In the city of Pembroke Pines, they did the front and the back. And people used to gladly show you the backyard.

We have very proud of the planting backyards.

But but I understand for for every there's a lot of reasons why. It it's better, just the front.

Yeah. Yeah.

Is there any other discussion on the, tree award?

I Do we need to do a motion to add the word recent photo? Okay. So

I'll go back.

And do we need to do a motion also to don't mean, to to to do the write up in Midtown Cryer.

Tonight, we don't

have She already submitted it. So

It's already submitted. Okay.

And the newsletter, we don't need to do a motion for that. Correct?

Correct.

Just a minute. So we already modified the minutes anyway. Okay. So then I'd I'd like to do a motion to add the wording for the photo for the flower award nomination to be a recent photo. Add

the Time. Word You need a time.

You wanna put within the past sixty days? Two months?

Ninety days would be fine with me, but

Okay.

Something recent.

Recent within the past ninety days?

Yep.

Okay. So my motion is to add the wording for it to be a recent photo within the past ninety days.

Now, just to make sure, there's a write up online about filling out the forms. Is it going to go there? That's the only place that that is mentioned that I'm aware of. You'd have to I'd have to pull up the website to look. I'll

do both.

Oh, she's gonna update it. Okay. Great. Wonderful. So do we have a second?

I have

a I'm sorry.

Do we have a second?

Just a Can we have discussion on the motion after It's been

seconded We can have before we discussion after the second, yes.

Right. Okay. So Kim seconded.

I seconded.

Okay.

The

question I have, if we can go back, Michele, to that page where it lists the criteria of what you have to do to nominate. Or what you are required to there we go. Okay. I think it says submit yes, it says submit two to three high quality photos of landscapetree. So it does say photos instead of just photo. So do we want to just do it that way to modify the motion? Just say instead photo, say photos for flower award must be recent within the past ninety days.

Yes.

Okay.

Yes. We're going to modify that motion

to say photos Pleural. Pleural.

We got the wording down? Okay, thank you. All in favor?

Aye.

Opposed?

Aye. Sorry, I was in favor.

It carries.

Okay.

Okay. Alright. Moving on. Utility bill inserts.

Mhmm. Yep. This year. They go out in March.

Mhmm. Okay.

So that you say they go in go out in March? Correct. And this is it?

Yes. Mhmm. Yep. Tree pruning tips and how to hire an arborist, just some general information regarding tree care.

Just a question on the arborists and the tree trimming people in the village of Wellington. Do they have to register with the village in order to work in the village?

They have I mean, it's you get a sticker for your window. It just says you've registered. But I don't know if they enforce

they they

also I ran my business. I did. At each municipality I worked in, I had a you know, I registered my business with. Yeah. But they they do have that here, but I don't know if it's enforced.

Oh, okay.

Because, you know, some of the companies cut the trees and then carry the debris away. Some of the other companies cut the trees and leave them on the sidewalk for the city to pick up.

Our landscape code says they must remove it.

JAMES Okay. So those ones that aren't removing it are probably not registered with the village, maybe.

JAMES And a third thing is happening. Some of the people are telling their homeowners and charging them for removing it. And then that we're going to have the you can call the people the city hires to come pick up stuff separately. And they're not doing it.

Yeah. So maybe that's probably

He's code enforcement charged her $300 to remove the debris and didn't get removed and didn't get removed. And I said something to her, oh, paid money for that. He ended up having to call them to come do it because I wasn't going let the city pay for it. After she paid

for The city picks up a lot of material.

I know, they do.

They do. They do.

A ton of material.

Yep.

I almost thought that that palms were not included, and then I saw this tiny picture. But it but it is. It's it's, you know, because I just there's so many palm trees. So I was, like, saying, you know, where's where's the education on the palm tree? I see. There's a tiny picture there. But I know, because a lot of people don't realize it's supposed to be, like, a horizontal line pruning. You, a lot of times, see those palm trees hacked up and there's like three three leaves only on the top. That's

the top. They call it the pencil top where it's Three

by one. Trim? Yes.

Yeah. Some people call it that too.

It's bad. And not the FPLV trims, that's worse.

That's the last one. Last one does that.

We can hold that until after the meeting. I'll explain that to you.

Yes. Do you know who you're talking to?

No. Well, I mean, I think it looks pretty good.

Jammed as much information as we could in into that. Yeah.

Yeah. That's good. This is very, very useful.

I like it. Yeah. For sure.

Okay. Any other comments about the utility bill insurance?

I've always thought that was a nice brochure. It has so much information in it. And it's simple to understand. It really is.

Moving on to general comments. Opening the floor to comments.

Go ahead. Okay. So I have an update on the garden tour. Would you like to hear that? Sure. Sure. Okay. This is a flyer. You can go to our website, wellingtongardenclub.org, and across the banner there's a little page link, actually, to the garden tour, with this flyer there that you can print out and share if you like with friends. Or you can also, you can make payments that will come a little bit later.

You can make payments online as well. For the tickets, the tickets are $60 in advance. And on the day of event, there'll be $75 There will be gardens, maybe five or six, seven gardens in the area, in the general area. Mostly in Wellington. There might be one or two just outside our area of Wellington.

So it's called twenty twenty six Garden Tour, Garden Inspirations, Saturday, 03/21/2026, from ten to 4PM. Seven beautiful gardens at this point, each showcasing a unique style. English gardens, tropical Florida, tropical plants in Florida, native gardens, some large, some small. And there will be vendors there on one of the tours, a couple of the tours. But the most important thing that I would like to share with you is that the reason this is our largest fundraiser, and the proceeds benefit our youth programs, specifically scholarships and civic beautification and environmental efforts.

Thank you. Very nice. Any

other comments?

I have some, John. There a a while ago, I got a flyer from West Palm Beach. I'm not sure why because I live in Wellington, but they do a rain barrel giveaway once a year in November. And, I think I gave it to you, Will, a couple of months ago to show you it. And so I'd like to talk a little bit about Wellington should do a rain barrel giveaway. We're you know, to for water conservation. So people are not using the city water, using our table water. We can use the water that comes from the rain if that's something that we could be a part of.

I mean, it have it would have to be funded.

Right. That's probably the biggest thing.

The rain barrels. Well, Palm Beach was. Mhmm. The city of West Palm Beach provided the rain barrels for the residents of West Palm Beach.

Something that might have to go to council.

Yeah. Or we could do maybe, at birthday, like, some giveaways, you know, or, rain barrel giveaways, like just not for anybody or everybody, but have a drawing or something like that, like

you do with the tree.

Don't they

have It would something depend on the funding. Mean, you have to kind of see what funding is available and then scale it from that.

Wasn't there like a conflict with the date last year, right? With the Water Matters whole thing that the the the water conservation that's being done? And then when we had our awards being given, there was some sort of like it was the same it was the same week as the

The mouse plant sale.

Right. Right. Right. But but isn't it in line with when is the water conservation there there's another event that's prominent in the county. County. There's a county water conservation time period or something like that. And in Broward, I know they call it Water Matters Day. Not

familiar with

That would be like, you know, where they would give out things like that. But I mean, I think residents would love that. Free rain barrels of wooden like that in their yard.

The problem with that is that South Florida has not had a significant drought since the late '90s. That's the last significant drought we had, where we actually had water restrictions that went on. So to me Oh, that

happened in the 2000s, because we moved here in 2007. And shortly after that, we were on some water restrictions because we could only I could only water two to three days a week, you know, Monday Monday, Wednesday, Friday Sure. Depending on your house number.

Yeah. I always thought that once those water restrictions happened, I think the city voted to keep them in place, that you only water certain days of the week.

I think it's the three days a week.

Three days a week.

Yeah, I think it's

the Yeah. And it just depends the day depending on what your address is. Is it odd or even? Something like that.

Yeah. It's a great way to

So it's still here.

Water conservation, having a rain barrel, for sure. I mean

Oh, yeah.

Having a rain barrel. It doesn't matter if, you know, you have a rain barrel. You're able to water your yard whenever.

So how does the city you said the council is gonna have to would have to

approve something that would have to go up the chain.

Yeah. Can we get it on the agenda for the council then to have them on their maybe their consent agenda or something like that? I don't know if it has to be discussed. If we

had some kind of a

We'd have to make

cost a motion analysis for recommendation to We'd have to have something to present to them to actually vote on with basically the breakdown of the project.

I gotcha.

Cost analysis.

Okay.

The problem with rain barrels is you've got to do what some of the IFAS folks have done at their houses. And you're talking about 200 gallon industrial, three or four of them around your house if you're watering the whole yard. If you're just worried about watering your flowers with non treated water, then that's completely different. But if you're attempting to replace watering from your sprinkler system that's coming out of a well, you're talking about considerably more volume of water than it's Sprinkler system, yeah. I mean, some of these golf courses, for example, even in the middle of the drought are moving 3,000,000 gallons of water a day.

Yeah, I can attest

to that. That's when you're getting fined for watering on Wednesday. And they're moving 3,000,000 gallons a day. So it's a very very confused process. And the effectiveness of it is Not what it should be.

The volume needed to water the entire yard, we wouldn't be able Right. To store that in a

These just 55 gallon drums that they you had to apply for it and then go pick them up. And they gave you a whole setup and how it works and how to collect it and how to keep it, you know, from

growing old. I have

that, just so you know.

Gene have Joyner

a 65 gallon truck.

Gene Joyner did it out on his property. And he's got, like, four If you see on the back of some of the ag trucks, it's a giant plastic thing that's about five feet by five feet by five feet

Yeah.

I've seen the big,

big ones. In in a metal cage.

Brain.

Yeah. He's got, like, four or five of those around of his house. Yeah. And he's filling those every time. And Well, I

just use it for my garden.

Okay.

So anybody that would be interested in water conservation. Yeah.

Have one at my house. It's two fifty gallons.

For potted plants, you know.

It's enough to water my small native area.

It's an awareness to the people for water conservation.

Maybe we don't maybe do a giveaway per se, but maybe we provide information on how to make one.

Can do that too. That would be easy. I

think the funding might be an issue with with the barrel giveaway.

Even if the county gets involved if the because I don't know how when West Palm Beach did it. I didn't delve too deep into how they how how they got

procure all of the barrels.

Right. How they got the barrels, how they paid for it. That's something I could look into. But, you know, if if we got a grant for it, you know, to to do this, you know, so many barrels and, you know, people apply for them. Mhmm. You know, we talk about awareness, putting things in the newspaper, sending out little, you know, in bills and stuff, and that's just another awareness, you know. First off, if somebody sees free, a lot of people will perk up and go, oh, free? Okay. I'm gonna see what this is about, you know, and that gives somebody, you know, kinda makes them think a little bit.

Maybe, the South Florida Water Management District

is part of that. Yeah.

Yeah. So if you want to do some follow-up on that and get some information for us, I think we should pursue that. That sounds like a good idea.

Okay. I agree.

Thank If you can get some information, maybe bring it back next meeting. Okay. The only thing is when is our next meeting is after?

It's in March.

March. March.

Mhmm. You can always do it for next You can

Okay. Yeah. That's something ongoing anyway because

It is.

So I I say, yeah, if you can do we need to do a motion for her to get information to bring it back now? Okay. The other thing I was going to ask is, on the flower award thing, is it possible, like, if if we select, okay, obviously I'm thinking hypothetically, if there's a business that that that is applies, right? Do we have to say, okay, they're going to get recognized? Because businesses like recognition.

They get recognition.

So, Will, is part of, one is, I don't know if I maybe missed it.

You're off agenda. That's passed.

Okay. Well, I'd like to, mean It's comments. It's I'm asking you a question. It The

time to discuss that was ten minutes or fifteen minutes ago.

Okay.

I know I'm being abrupt, but I'm trying to be the chair.

No, that's fine. So what comments are acceptable then?

Comments on subjects we haven't already covered.

Okay. We didn't cover that, but it's okay. We don't have to talk about it. So I'd I'd like to bring

up another thing also. And it kinda goes along with water conservation. The city of Wellington has code compliance. And one of the things, I'm running into is that there's no real there's nothing in there about native yards, native plantings, zeroscaping, for water conservation, for another city. You know, Will is great at getting native plants and planting them around the city, but you don't see it in a lot of people's yards.

I see a lot of grass, a lot of tropical plants that are not native or not even Florida friendly, you know, and that wastes a lot of water. It doesn't feed any of our critters, that are in the that are that are around, and we need to bring more of that into Yes, we have, the beautiful native plantings around the city, but there's more space in the homeowners in their yards than there is in the city yards. And we should be encouraging people to not only plant native plants, to bring make a refuge for the birds, the bees, the butterflies, and other critters that, you know, help, you know, help feed us eventually. But, there, in the code, it talks a lot about hedging plants and and you don't hedge native plants and there's nothing in there about, they they know nothing about letting a native plant grow to its native form or planting, native plants or having native ground cover rather than grass and pulling out the grass because grass uses a lot of water, It pollutes the air, you know, because you have to mow it. And a lot of people use chemicals, that goes down into our water, our water tables.

So, you know, is there something as a board that we can do to help make changes to the code about native plantings in yards or native yards, people that wanna go mostly native, get rid of grasses, get rid of get rid of all of the stuff that doesn't feed anything and uses a lot of water. Is there anything we can do as a board to help make changes to the code or present that to the council or to the code compliance to get some changes done on that?

Well, I think they did they recently redo the code?

It's in progress.

So it's in progress. Would there be a way that she could send a text message or some kind of a message to the people that are writing the code?

And just Planning and zoning.

Planning and zoning.

Damien Newell. I think there's some sort of requirement that you