ricky
november 17 2020 one big
hello
and good afternoon i'd like to call the
november 17th meeting of the bexley tree
and public gardens commission to order
i'd like to call the role
larry hellman here
sheila straub
here dave wakeman here celeste williams
here uh jim wilson will be here at 4 30
linda zubnik susan quintenz here
our alternate barb giller barb are you
on zoom
she wants to be on soon
you don't see her
well
if barb if you can hear us and we can't
hear you you might want to check and
make sure you're unmuted
if she's on okay
okay okay um ellen bowden ex-officio
up here molly o'donnell
ex-officio and in addition to
those members we have mayor kessler
grant archer city forester staff
consultant elena andrews and
jordan cavallaro is ill and will not be
with us today
so we have a quorum
and we won't go through the rules for
zoom because
we may not have any zoomies so we'll go
on to approval of the minutes of october
20th
2021
a concern not a big concern but on the
mayor's report on 3b it was talking
about how we were going to have a bridge
built
between
at the
uh
[Music]
southwest park and i just want to make
sure that it was a
a uh pedestrian bridge
and not a vehicular bridge yes it's not
a big deal but i just thought you wanted
more definition all right
mayor would you like to speak to that
and clarify that uh so it's a uh it's a
freight bridge it's designed to carry
large trucks only oh
uh yeah we'll i'll be talking about that
on my update some more okay okay so
later thank you but that's not an issue
with the minutes i think the minutes are
right the minutes are all right and
we'll leave so we'll leave that subject
to be defined later
any other additions corrections
revisions
then i'll take a motion
is there a second
okay motion has been made and seconded
that we approve the minutes of last
month's meeting as emailed all those in
favor say aye aye
all those will pull the same sign motion
carries
now do we have any additions to the
agenda mr straub i think you had one
addition you wanted us to add and we can
put down an old business
do you want me to speak now on that
or yes yes
all right so this is in reference to the
bexley women's
house and garden tour
and we had kind of chatted last month
about potentially having a
tree connection with an area that may
work with a focus on the tour and um
i think the south bexley
houses that are on the tour may be a
really good connection there's a couple
of them near havenwood park
so i
i have a meeting from at seven with the
bexley women's club so i just wanted to
hear your comments
well i'd like to ask grant if uh if you
could comment on that between havenwood
and um
the south
tree walk do you feel there would be a
good collection of trees i know there's
a fabulous magnolia down there i don't
know how close it is to havenwood
uh yeah no that would that's on pleasant
red yeah that's too far away quite a
ways but yeah the walk there is a good
walk there's a lot of
unique trees that we have in bexley okay
okay so i think that's a possibility the
uh south walk is on
the arboretum website so you can always
have
some of the members go there and see
exactly where it goes okay list the
trees well thanks for being our
ambassador yes thank you for your
endorsement great
i think it's a
i great idea yeah
are there any other additions to the
agenda
okay then we're gonna go on to
announcements small victories and
residents comments and start with ellen
bowden chair trees for bexley i think
she's gonna give us an update on the
campaign yes
excuse me the end of october the trees
for bexley um letters were sent out
over uh susan and the mayor's signatures
and as of yesterday november the 16th
we had 67 donations for a total of 19
912 and 50 cents so we think we're off
to a great start
and i think people are finding the
projects to be very attractive as you
know we're doing two projects
this year
in jeffrey park
redesigning the circle in front of the
front door
and infilling trees on the north
boundary in the front part of the
mansion park we had spent the
summer removing
the invasive honeysuckle and uncovered
lots of hemlocks and space so we're
going to go in and infill that
thank you ellen and we should note that
um eleanor will be doing the design for
that and we're excited to see it
probably tomorrow right
[Laughter]
soon soon we'll say that i'm going to
show it here in a second yeah okay
something in january yes
um now we're going to go on to residents
comments and we're glad to see
so many of you here with us today
there are a few guidelines that
i'd like to mention to you first of all
you'll go up to the podium
and tell us who you are and where you
live and make sure the green light
this is on otherwise when we're
recording we can't hear you
in addition to that here are some other
guidelines the tree commission
is
does not comment or discuss findings of
other commissions
nor do we comment on subjects under
review from other commissions
as a commission
we will not be party to negative
comments
our comments presented today should be
germane to the subject we're talking
about
if there's any issues or if the
discussion becomes contentious we'll
take a five-minute recess
so with that said
um
we have two residents who are here today
to talk about trees on cassingham
uh mr scott hoover and is miss liska
here
so
elena yeah that's good i'm gonna turn
off the lights for a minute
i thought before we got into the
particulars
we might just look at some of these uh
topic areas
about
a street tree planting so all of you
will know that it's not a whimsical
behavior
there's some science behind what we do
so you may want to just scroll somewhere
through some of those topic lines
and then of course there's benefits of
street trees and larry do you want to
talk about those if elena can scroll
down
yeah i think by way of
context maybe i think is important here
and without because i know we have two
cases of this so let me lay the
groundwork um
in effect we have two realms we have a
public realm and we have a private realm
and the public realm is is represented
by the right-of-way and the right-of-way
is that zone that delivers services to
the lots
so it gives us a street for access
sidewalks for pedestrians
utilities for the most part are all in
their storm water
sometimes sewer gas
sometimes electric in terms of the lines
on the side
and then also a tree lawn called a tree
lawn
and street trees and street trees
are in effect considered part of the
infrastructure that's then delivered to
lots and we'll cover and those i'll let
you read those but those are a lot of
the things that that make it a integral
part of the infrastructure
then there's the private realm and the
private realm
is the individual lot that then begins
at the edge of the right-of-way and has
some depth to it i think the lots on
cassidy are 140 feet or so or on
cassingham 50 feet wide i think that's
the general lot
and then on that private realm there are
certain
requirements placed on that private
realm for example there needs to be a a
front yard that is uniform
and that front yard then establishes the
building line of the front of the house
their side yard rear yard requirements
and there's an open space requirement so
in other words someone can't fill up
their entire lot with pavement or
building there there has to be a certain
amount of green space
remaining on the lot after house and
garage and patio and all of that are
constructed
then i would put a third element on this
and that is i would call that the civic
realm and the civic realm is a
combination of the fronts of the houses
the front yard space
and
the
public infrastructure and the reason
that that's the civic realm
is because it's visible and shared by
everybody
so while backyards can be private
uh front yards are open and visible and
in effect have an impact on everyone's
property
and so that's why for example things you
can do in a backyard like fencing you
cannot do in a front yard because
fencing is to be
to to be private in the front yard uh
that's that's really
not to occur in that zone
so the bottom line
when we think about
infrastructure and we think about street
trees
that has become a standard part of how
we deal with all of our bexley streets
every single bexley street
has a designated street tree and has had
decades of investment in street trees on
those trees for those reasons and more
uh so i just wanted to provide that a
little bit of background so that so that
so people understand uh that we've got a
pretty well established process here for
good reasons uh because that has led to
a lot of
benefits in terms of infrastructure
storm water and so forth but obviously
it has a safety factor because
it actually encourages pedestrians to be
outside more pedestrians outside the
safer street uh and certainly there's a
there's a beauty part of it too and and
backslash a beautiful place because of
its trees because of attention to its
houses so i just want to establish that
as context so we understand thank you
thank you larry and then i was going to
go on to the last topic which is
the information that we have received
from a tree canopy study that was done
earlier this year showing that the tree
canopy cover in the city is 39
the right-of-way is 43
and uh the right-of-way has only 26
percent of all the canopy in the city
so with that background if anybody else
want to add anything i'm going to turn
the lights back on and mr hoover would
you please come to the podium remember
to turn this little button for the green
light
and
mr hoover and mrs hoover live at 137
south cassingham
do you and do you have um an image of
their
home okay
well maybe i spoke
yeah
yeah maybe i spoke
yeah
okay
so well welcome
thank you appreciate being here uh my
name is scott hoover uh my wife could
not make it this evening uh we live at
137 south casscan i've lived there since
1985.
um
the does everybody have i submitted with
my
uh requests i submitted pictures of the
lot as they may have though yeah here we
go yeah okay i've got extra copies here
if you needed them
um
i'm
i'm not questioning the legality of the
tree placement i'm well familiar with
the with the tree line and the right of
way and property lines and a lot of what
mr hellman uh the guidelines that he
laid out i'm i'm quite familiar with all
that so i'm not questioning any of that
the my only request is
uh
the way we have used the lawn over 37
years the way my children used it the
way my grandchildren are using it now
the way the children use it on my lawn
on both sides of me i've got
elementary grade
kids that live on the house that's next
door that way the house you do not see
on the other way i've got teenage girls
they all use my lawn they use it to play
on to play through to play games
the our
volleyball badminton net that we set up
on that lower lot
uh stretches across there perfectly from
the sidewalk to the ball up hill
we play batman they're often a tree in
the middle of that would not allow us to
do that the only useful part we have of
our lawn of our
lawn at all is what you see the backyard
has no useful space to it whatsoever
um
we play
everything out there there's football
games wiffle ball games badminton
frisbee everything's it's played on that
lawn right where you see
where the oak is supposed to the crab
apple was placed in there
um
mr archie even though bear and i do
about three weeks ago maybe on the tree
lawn i think the crab apple was placed
about three weeks ago maybe
so that was put in there as part of the
treeline they came through cassingham
about a month three weeks ago and put in
i don't know a couple dozen
crabapples so that's fine don't question
that whatsoever in fact another one was
taken out there earlier in the spring
that was
leaning over quite a bit so they've said
he took that out put this in place of it
it's the oak tree that i that i just
don't
it just would really be intrusive on our
lot it just would just really
be
how we use it in the winter time there's
a little hill there you can't see it by
that picture but we do have a part of a
hill
on our lot it kind of has a lower
plateau and an upper plateau that you
can see there
uh that all the kids use that for riding
their discs down
and where the white circle is i don't
know if you can see it in the other
picture i think you can see the other
picture you can kind of see where the
placement is yes right there right at
the bottom of the hill right where this
right where the uh
the plastic discs come to a landing
would be where the proposed tree is at
so
i just
i'm just
requesting that we
not put a tree there because of the way
that we use a lot and the enjoyment it
gives us so
that's that's pretty much it it's pretty
it's not it's not very complicated it's
pretty simple okay
um i i did want to to mention that the
residents of cassingham have come to the
city
and asked
um you know the city for ways in which
we can slow traffic on cassingham it's a
big concern to them
and that has helped us
kind of
speed up the process of planting trees
on cassingham so i think that's a factor
that you
that you should know you may not agree
with it but i think i think it is
something to take into consideration
since you know there have been residents
that have come forward yeah i'm well
aware of that and
then there has been some speed issues on
casting ham right uh i think
i think when the electronic sign up
helped a lot uh the city put up there
you know it tells you what your speed is
and kind of tell people right away that
you're speeding i think that's helped a
lot i think the the trees in the tree
line might help a lot
i personally don't know how a tree
placed there would slow down anybody
down on cassiam that's my own personal
opinion but
um i am aware of the okay good good i i
did i wanted to bring that up okay in
case you didn't know so are there
comments
uh ellen do you want to review your
graphic and then i'll be happy to talk
okay as well
so um
um
for those in the audience and for mr
hoover elena andrews is our staff
consultant and she has done a diagram um
that we felt would be helpful because it
puts the tree in context with the green
space in your yard as well as you know
the placement on the street
so
enough you could share a little bit of
of what you've drawn and
how you see it of course part of the
landscape thanks for coming today sure
um so yeah so this is uh 137 north
cassingham the um south cassingham sorry
i live a little further south in front
of the school um the property line is a
bit shifted because of the aerial taken
off of the auditor's website but this
gives basically a general idea of where
the right-of-way line is in relationship
to
casting ham cassingham is
one of the
few streets within columbus that
actually has a wider right-of-way line
than some of the other residential
streets simply because it has the
possibility that it could be turned into
a boulevard i don't think the city ever
has any plans for that but that's one of
the reasons why the right-of-way is so
much further back behind the sidewalk
and that there is an opportunity for um
having some of these street trees um
both in the tree lawn and as well as in
the um
in the the front yards of the of the
residents on the area so we're looking
at the sidewalk this is the approximate
location of where the little two inch
crab apple was planted and then this is
the approximate location of where the
oak was going to go
about five feet behind the sidewalk
what i wanted to show graphically is um
basically this is sort of showing what
the canopy of the oak would be and that
is a two inch caliper size that little
dot that you can see there in proportion
versus so you know when it's first gonna
go in and oaks are relatively slow
growing trees and so the dashed line
that you see here that is probably going
to be within 50 to 75 years is when that
tree is actually going to reach its full
maturity
and i think the other thing that is
helpful to see within the ariel
and as a lot of the tree commission
members know having walked the um the
city earlier this year there are a lot
of gaps within casting ham where there
are trees that have not been there and
so cassingham doesn't have a continuous
tree line of large growth trees there
have been a number that have come down
both within the storm that happened
about five or six years ago as well as
just trees that have gone by so
there are a number of properties um this
being one of them that there is a
visible
kind of hole where there's you know
there's not tree coverage within that
front yard um and so that's essentially
just what this diagram wanted to be able
to show everyone thanks elena uh mr
hellman yeah
looking at the aerial i think we can see
what some of the issues are not only on
this street but other streets uh in that
over the years what what was otherwise a
backyard activity throwing a football
generally um
kind of gets co-opted because we have
additions we have a three-car garage
we've got a dish all these houses have
had additions added to them we've had
patio space we've had extra parking
space in the back
which is then the loss of green space
and so that activity then uh and it's
understandable said well then we'll
shift that activity to the front well
the front yards can only do so many
things and um so i think that has to be
a co-shared space and certainly not
against any athletic activity out there
but it would mean that we can't have a
little tree that has that little impact
on that space and that somehow impacts
athletic activity that seems out of
balance uh okay may i ask you what do
you mean by out of balance sir
that seems like not it's all for green
space and nothing for trees and i don't
know what play activities that small
amount that small circle uh would take
away i mean if that tree were already
there would you then be asking for it to
be removed
if there was an oak in place that would
you ask for would you be asking for it
to be removed if the tree was existing i
don't think you'd be removed unless it
was dying or something capacity but but
it's so but but it would it would then
maybe be still impacting right so i mean
we have to reach a balance point here
and uh i
maybe that should be the spot where tag
is that's home run or home base you know
i mean there are ways to deal with that
but that's a to me that's a pretty small
impact on
the ability to have open play in the
front yard
obviously
i respect your opinion sir but for our
family the way we use that's not a small
impact it'd be a large impact
i'm sorry i said for
for for you it may be a small impact for
us for our family in the way that we use
a lot it would be a large impact not a
small impact
are there other comments
we've placed other trees along here
again
also are there others that are going to
be planted or designated
on the same side of the street or on the
other side of the street
yes i think grant there were what 50
oaks that are going to be planted
twenty-two oaks
on the sidewalk and there was fifty-five
crab apple trees planted between the
purple sidewalk
i think you know when you talk about
them
i mean our we looking i guess longer
term of you know
trying to create that
the la
and
putting as much
cream that we can add
other comments would would it be
helpful if the tree were moved more
toward the north so it's away from the
hill that is being used
for
sledding
i don't know what the other
considerations are as far as um water
lines electric lines
sewer lines um i mean i'm i'm assuming
that grant chose this location
with some
you know rationale in mind
correct
you know we could maybe move it left or
right a little bit or
um
i'd have to go back out and relook at
the lot to see where the water
downspouts
and stuff are
that may i answer a question
excuse me may i ask a question yes
uh
is it
is the placement of the tree
on the law
mr archer's recommendation
and then the committee pretty much
accepts that recommendation am i correct
with that or
mr mr archer is much more knowledgeable
about the utility lines and what is
happening on the street than we are the
tree commission selects
the species and boats on it and we also
approve
a certain number of trees to be planted
that mr archer has found locations for
okay so so
so that is a correct assumption that he
makes the recommendation on where on the
lot
and then you pretty much accept that
exactly correct okay
so
um
yeah
without the vote being taken
my it sounds to me like the committee's
pretty much leaning towards accepting
the tree
if that is the case i like the thought
and the possible recommendation that i'm
sorry i don't know your name
mrs williams mrs williams had
what that being is
is it possible then
if mr archer were to come back out to
the lot
and we meet
and see if there is another place on the
lot that he's acceptable with and is
possibly less objectionable to me i
think rather than north i think maybe
nor just puts it in the same middle law
but maybe it can go a little
west uh but wherever if
mr archer is more
uh is still pleased with it
and west would be closer to the house
uh moving it closer to the house moving
closer to the hill and then be less
objectionable being in in what i call in
the middle of that downward plateau i'm
i'm reluctant to to promise uh move a
vocation without mr archer
being being present and and looking at
you know what's there well i'm not
asking for any promise here and now i'm
just saying that if it's possible then
to recommend mr archer come out to the
lot he and i can meet and see if he
agrees that there's no place on the lot
to place a tree there's also less
objection will be made
and how do you feel about that mr archer
oh yeah we've done that in the past i
you know i just i picked that location
due to the location of the crab apple
and
other plantings around it because i know
there's a replacement going to the north
uh
because that maple tree was removed last
year
but yeah i'm fine with trying to find a
happy medium
and still staying within a a uh a um
acceptable street tree line
correct yeah it would have to go within
you know what's already the line that's
existing but yeah we can play around
with that
that that would be appreciated
yep not a problem
are there other comments or concerns
just so we're clear because we we don't
want you to have to go through this
again
are we saying the tree can move
inside that box or it must stay outside
the box to be in the public right-of-way
so that would leave it
moving to the edge of that line is that
what you're talking about uh
i i wasn't speaking inside or outside
the box i was just proposing the mr
archer come out and find some places get
this resolved
at least as a generalization okay that's
helpful so i just you know are we
talking about
i'm not swallowing right now
okay
well right my way that arrow is right
now very close to that arrow if you move
it down just slightly about right about
there was where it was where the last
tree was on the lot
on private property well i understand
that i understand that you're saying
that's not on the right way i understand
that i'm just saying that that way with
that arrow is where the last tree that
was on that lot was on that tree was
moved it was taken out in about
three or four years after we lived there
because it died
um it was a very old tree and it was it
was limbs falling all over the place so
that you're saying you could still see a
little bit of indentation law now where
that tree was at
in my
preference if it could be another tree
planted it would go there
if you're telling me no we can't do that
it has to be down in the right of way
then about where that arrow is there i
would say that'd be my the second option
and my last option would be with the
plan location okay okay if that's
helpful as i said there is a line of
street trees there already i believe
grant
correct right we have to stay within
that
line
relatively within that line i mean
that line is a wide line that we can
play but i think we can figure something
out that's why i think it's helpful
if you come out and look at it and then
we can come to some
agreement at that point hopefully i mean
the hole is adjusted
right depending on what we find on when
we start digging so yeah that's not a
problem okay there is a uh there are
some lines over that way i mean the new
gas line that was put in on southcast
ham runs up that side of the house uh
the new water line was put in i have a
sump pump and that line is on that side
so there are some lines to consider yes
do you need to have oops come out first
oops has already been out there they've
already sprayed a couple weeks ago yeah
no i i think we'll be fine okay okay all
right i'm ready for a motion well i
don't think we need to take any action
because the uh until you get it nailed
down what it is because the decision has
already been made
to plant here so to change it we need an
actual location and where it's going to
go to accept that new location
and is that
the wish of other commission members to
delay
we're going to plant a tree within city
right away that is
[Music]
that looks that's in line with other
existing trees
could this be taken care of as a staff
approval i mean if if if the tree
commission is okay with
tweaking it and then it's moving i'm
happy to go out with you guys as well
and kind of see it and then we can just
do a staff approval so that you don't
have to come back in a month in december
it's not holding up whenever the trees
are going to be dug and installed
is that how is that feeling to other
commission members very good are you
okay with that mr wakeman yes sorry miss
straub okay
we remand this to staff uh grant elena
to meet with the uh
the resident to determine uh tree
placement that works for him
uh
if we're unable to make an agreement
then the state this location would stand
is there a second a second is there any
discussion
okay emotions made and seconded that we
approve um staff consultant working with
our city forester to find a suitable
location
if different from the proposed placement
all those in favor say aye hi all those
proposed same sign okay motion carries
okay
so i think probably
forthwith to meet with mr hoover so i
know that grant's anxious to get those
trees dug yeah so see if we can get that
done thank you very much for coming i'll
reach out to you
um i'll i'll reach out to you and we'll
set up a time soon you have my cell
phone number uh
could you give it to me six one four
okay five six one uh-huh five six five
two awesome
that's on the internet now scott so
that's going to be all
now you tell me
thank you all thank you thank you
okay
our second resident from south
castingham is is it christine miss
christine liska 51 south casting ham she
is also here to appeal the decision to
plant a tree
in the right of way in front of her
house
so
would you like to come forward
we've we've kind of done their preamble
on setting up the foundations for what
we do and why we do it right is the
green light still on for you okay you
might want to bring the mic a little bit
forward thank you
yeah there that's helpful
christine liska i live at 51 south
cassingham i moved in in 1984.
so i've been there a long time i sort of
have the same issue as
mr hoover
although i'm
warming up to it um
i think my
my problem was that it was going to look
like a stick in the middle of my yard
and look
odd that it was just standing in the
middle of the yard with no
real direction or
you know reason for it to be standing in
the middle of the air like it because
it's going to be small
um and just going around it you know um
and i i don't know i guess this is a
question would we be responsible to take
care of the tree
that's that's a good question because
it's a city tree and it's in the right
of way the city has a responsibility to
maintain it
okay and i did talk to mr archer about
it
um i think um we talked about maybe not
having it like right smack dab in the
middle um
that maybe we could come to a compromise
and putting it
he we kind he kind of looked at it there
was there is a line
um
where the other trees are so it would be
in that line
um with the other trees
um it wouldn't be in or out of that line
um but it just wouldn't be right stuck
in the middle sorry so you're so you're
asking us to consider having it moved
north or south
along the way yeah and
mr archer said it could be done easily
without it to clarify the so the house
to the north the trees are set back
further than the house to the south
weird but
i agreed that we would put it in line
with the trees that were closer to the
sidewalk
and and is there an issue with utilities
no no okay
as mr archer said he um there
i think we discussed that we saw where
the
problem would be and it wouldn't be
on the gas line or the water line
um i think my concern and i guess i can
ask um the question um
that i've lived in bexley my whole life
i grew up here
uh my parents
lived here
um
so
i know we have i mean bexley is special
because of the trees
and i love trees so i'm not against a
tree really um
i am concerned though that there's we
have like what 15 000 trees in bexley
and i'm not sure that all the trees and
i can look across the street and on
either side of me are really being taken
care of
um the way they should be i know there's
only so many of mr archer and his staff
and the hours that they work
um
it would put
each person
having 625 trees an hour to really take
care of them properly
i've had um there are city trees on my
street where big limbs have come down
the trees on either side of me and
across the street need help
there's dead in a lot of them
so i know you want to keep planting
trees and that's great
but my concern is it's like you know
the front of your house is falling down
but you're putting a room edition on the
back of it
so i don't know if you can keep up with
what needs to be done
with staff and taking care of what we
have
and now we're planning more
so are there any comments
oh no it's just it's i'm it's just a
concern i don't know if yeah if you're
aware
i'll speak for grant then grant can
speak for himself i mean i feel sorry
for trump
we have a very
sophisticated well maybe sophisticated
wrong word dedicated program uh uh about
how to take we have we have reams of of
stuff we look at when we take care of
our trees all of them uh there are a lot
of trees that people think are on city
property but they are not and something
and and all we can do there is to
recommend people you know that brand's
going to fall out you gotta you know
when we see these things but we don't
have the right to tell them to do that
so we have had some major incidents in
our town
of uh power lines going down cars
branches falling on cars they're not our
trees uh and you know that's that's just
the nature of the beast uh but uh really
dedicated crew
that takes care of all these trees
they're they're all they all have a
pruning schedule uh they all have a care
schedule uh and it's a it's a pretty
detailed program to take care of this
but your concerns are
are understood
i can assure you the ones i'm talking
about are city trees sure that i can
tell you right off the bat looking
across the street and on either side of
me and down the street or city trees any
other comments
any other questions
could you turn green please yeah uh and
the other point that i'd like to add to
mr hellman's statement is that
some of the trees that are in bexley are
are trees that we no longer will plant
and they they are failing
and yet there are other ones that are
worse off that we need to take down
first such as like silver maples they
are on our list to take out
but there are other ones that may cause
more destruction and they take
precedence but we are
part of our purpose of our committee
itself is to make sure that we are
planting the best kind of trees for our
properties and that they're not as
invasive and that the root systems are
not going to cause problems and so
mr archer is working on this all the
time he's like he speaks another
language sometimes
with all the different varieties and
we appreciate what he adds to our
to to our residency and city any other
questions
so if it makes sense uh whenever
this visit is scheduled
at you know go up four doors or uh ten
doors or whatever it is and let's and so
you're going to be okay if this shifts
north and south somewhat
yeah i think we talked about where
uh okay and
he was mr archer was in agreeance to
that he was extremely helpful um
i was kind of upset that we were not
given notice that the trees were going
to be planted that i was afraid one day
i was just going to wake up and go get
my coffee and go what the hell's out in
my front yard
yeah and so i just think for
consideration
because the trees are
quote we think in our yard that it would
be nice to have a heads up
that hey this is what we've decided on
and this is when they're going to be
planted
so just respect for the homeowner right
you're absolutely correct because what
people
um you know
this has happened to to us as well uh in
the past where uh you know i put a stone
wall in my front yard and i discover
it's not my front yard it's the city and
i have to get a hold harmless and so you
think you kind of make the assumption
the yard begins just right on the other
side of the sidewalk and it doesn't well
it varies from place to place so some
places it does but some places you
figure if you're cutting the grass it's
yours but that's not true no that's on
that sidewalk's on you too so there yes
yes right so any other questions
comments all right i just wanted to make
one thing i think to your comment
christine about uh notification um this
has been brought up previously and the
city now has decided that we are going
to send out blanket emails when we're
doing street tree planting similar like
what we had done with the gas line work
just to let people know that within the
next couple of months a tree is going to
be appearing in your yard
because you know we have heard that as
well so you know we we are trying to
listen and
be conscious and trying to be respectful
of your property thank you um when would
the trees be planted i think mr archer
you told me
that about when uh
probably sometime here in the next few
weeks okay
okay other comments um
does someone want to make a motion on
this like we did for mr hoover i
move we make the same motion and just
change the address to 51 south
this
let's see
let's let's articulate that motion a
little bit okay uh that staff will meet
with the resident uh to determine an
alternative location on a north-south
axis for that tree
um
and if again if there's the inability to
reach some conclusion where that goes
then this this spot will remain as the
one previously approved okay so a second
second is there any discussion
okay emotions been made and seconded
that uh staff meet with uh miss liska at
51 south cassingham and look at moving
the tree north or south but on the axis
of the tree line it's on that street
and if
an alternate location cannot be approved
that it will be
located in the
the area that was already marked by mr
archer
all those in favor say aye hi all those
opposing sign okay motion carries okay
thank you very much for coming thank you
okay
are there any other residents who wish
to speak if not we'll go on to review of
landscape applications
starting first with 407 northview
no that would that was uh that was for
it's going to be for
information and educational purposes but
i think we we covered
probably
as much as we wanted to say
okay 407 northview
let's see who's here for north
okay can you please come to the podium
please
and um
good evening good evening my name is
last name liu how are you
um
the
landscaping complete uh drawing
uh we're going to submit my landscaping
guys will
submit before next meetings
but
the rest quite question he already
responds i believe
so
if you have any question you know i can
answer our you know next meeting all
right thank you um miss andrews do you
want to set this up for us and tell us a
little bit about what the application
that we need to deal with today is hi mr
liu thank you so much for coming thank
you um so he is correct i have been
speaking with kevin fellow at kevin
fellona at simonello's and um and so
they are and this is a new build so it's
already been approved this lot has
undergone a lot split and so this blue
house is going to be torn down and a new
house is going to be built
in its place
um
there are so there are plans that have
been submitted um there are some
preliminary landscape plans that they
would like to to tweak but they have
gone out and looked at
the trees and kind of documented the
existing trees pretty much every tree on
the lot that you see is stain except for
this 40 inch siberian elm that is very
close to the existing kind of driveway
and sidewalk so this is where northview
is running this way rural avenue
basically dead ends to this a number of
years ago rural avenue did continue it
has been vacated by the city
and the new
access driveway will be located right
here pretty much right in the center of
where you can see this you know elm is
going to go
the existing street trees in the tree
lot um would remain as is um they have
gone out and kind of marked where the
driveway is going to be
um the point what we would like to look
at today is just to allow them to give
them an okay that this tree can be
demolished it's not in the greatest
shape um it's in a very you know awkward
position for for the plan and you know
we wouldn't necessarily want them to
have to have a driveway that you know
comes all the way over here and bisects
into into this area
there is there are brick curbs that um
they're going to be conscious of and to
protect there's an existing storm um
drain here
there have been other instances
within the city of um areas being
vacated like this and that we have not
asked the homeowners to improve the
sidewalk and so that's something that i
wanted to i think i said in the email
that if that's something that the tree
commission would like that's something
that we have to talk to the city about
it's not something that we would
necessarily put on as a burden to the
homeowner to take care of but the
homeowner has to decide you know
configure their lot to make sure that
you know it avoids this and they are
working on that so pretty much today um
this is just a couple of different
aerials just so you can kind of see this
is where that elm tree is the new
driveway would be coming in back through
this way and then the garage rear access
would be in through here
and then just again another kind of spot
where you can see where this tree would
necessarily need to go away so today is
kind of like a preliminary are they okay
to are they okay to remove the tree so
that they can go ahead they're in the
process right now of submitting
construction drawings
um but they would like to be able to you
know demolish the house demolish the
tree and get moving and then in december
we would be reviewing their landscape
plan for the new build and the storm the
storm drain goes where the storm drain
stays as is and so david koch has off
the city engineer has gone out and
looked at this site as well um and so
he's going to look at it where it is and
so we're hoping that we don't change
that
configuration at all so if the storm
drain stays the same then that driveway
width stays the same the existing
driveway with for the two properties
stays the same the it would be a little
wider so that's one of the things that
they're looking at right now right so it
would be it would basically come
starting right here and that's where the
driveway would be now would this new
driveway be
uh right against the old driveway no
the way that it's planned the way that
it's designed right now is that there's
like a
four to five foot green space in between
and that's one of the things that
they're looking at and confirming i mean
it's it's hard to get measurements to
get a feeling of measurements looking at
these aerials
but it it sure doesn't look like there's
15 feet from the southern edge of that
existing driveway uh the the northern
edge of the southern driveway
15 feet north and still miss the storm
drain but
if it's measured out then that's so be
it
okay
there are more than
16 feet
to the
the drain
so enough enough room for the
for the driveway
so you're saying from the driveway
from the property line is a full inch
from the ice fall
from the left side ice ball
the 4 engine
to the right side all belong to the
right property so they got a more than
more than 16 feet in there
so you got a plenty room there
not nothing well in the fair is almost
just like the life side driveway
nothing in the fair with the drain
when you drive in when there are
builders build the driveway
do we have any site plan i know there's
a site plan that was submitted as part
of the arb review yeah right there
there's there's this
now that's showing 20 feet
from the property line
right
so that's that's uh
basically three feet for the to the
property line of green space then 16
feet for the driveway so that's 20 feet
coming down to the street and and that
20 feet will miss
the storm drain that's that
that is where kevin had said that he
painted it out in that they will make
modifications as necessary to avoid this
the storm drain and so i don't know if
there's one thing in terms of with the
driveway i can certainly go back and
talk with kathy in terms of does it
necessarily does it have to be a 16 foot
wide driveway can it be smaller
and so i think that you know for us
whether or not we can certainly kind of
figure that out obviously because we
don't want you know during construction
to have to deal with that if this isn't
subject to us but i'm not sure the city
does 16 feet wide driveways i don't
think so either so i'll i can check with
kathy right okay i think the original
the architect drawing is a 12 feet
but the the the server guy put a 16 feet
yeah but you have to follow with the
architect the master plan
not that one you know what i mean yeah
no because we can't we can't there'd be
a variance to get 16 feet yeah what was
the what's the cd required how many
i think it's 12 i think right right
so the master plan it is 12 feet
but the server guy
is not a master plan so
kathy will know
when read the master plan okay so
yeah our only question today is yeah can
we take the elm down and i will
definitely follow up with the driveway
and you can see with the elm a lot of
the bark is starting to come off it's
it's not the healthiest i mean you can
see it's yeah the tree is not healthy
that tree is not healthy
look like a
the ball guy you know what i mean
no
and um when we see the plan in december
other trees will be marked on the plan
yes and so that's what this is they've
started to do that and based on the orig
based on the plan that they've started
the existing trees that they have there
are no other large growth trees that are
are coming down this is look like a tree
that would be demolished it looks like
when i went past there today that
there's a dead tree on the north side of
the property close to the property line
so it might be something that we check
okay
interior but yes so it's just the single
tree that we're voting on today mr
wilson
no no you're still not on okay
i have no concern with removing the um
um i would hope that the landscaping
plan would include a significant tree to
replace the elm as we try to preserve
the canopy but i i don't think that
removal of the um requires a lot of
discussion personally
and we don't know yet if there will be a
space to replace
that elm with the street tree or do we
know grant
there's two street trees currently on
the property um i don't know that we
would plant another one out there okay
uh this
this elm tree was actually supposed to
be removed by aep last year
uh for some reason they chose not to
but
it is a hazard for sure it's a bad tree
and it's a big ugly v so it needs to go
can i take a motion
i move that we approve the request to
remove the elm tree
okay is there a second
innate discussion
okay motion remains seconded that we
approved the
request to remove the elm tree at 407
northview avenue all those in favor say
aye
aye all those opposed same sign okay
motion carries all right mr liu we'll
see you back in december yeah thank you
can you please let kevin know of course
like mr wilson requires something you
know you can work together i certainly
will that make everything easy yes
definitely
that's our hope
so now we welcome
people representing 235 north roosevelt
uh mr mead are you presenting today
okay
so
um
have you come up and just state your
name and then because this is sort of an
unusual circumstance i'm going to turn
it over to miss andrews to explain
why why we're here what we're looking at
considering the time kind of frame that
got a little bit discombobulated
brian mead
you got brian mead and you are
i am the builder for 235 north roosevelt
this song is here the homeowner okay uh
so we're just trying to get the
landscaping approved because of my
oversight that it did not get done
earlier right okay so eleanor do you
want to give us a little bit of
background information yes um hi brian
good to see you
um
so this is not really only thank you
brian for saying that it was your
oversight it was also the city's
oversight a little bit as well so this
um this project was a a teardown and a
new build um it was approved um in i
think 2020 i believe like february 2020
or april but right after we started to
enact that the requirement that we
needed to have
full landscape plans in order for us to
review plans and so this was one of the
things that it just kind of
slid through the cracks and we have been
slowly trying to find ways to make sure
that we didn't do this so
um in terms of um the review they have
done i appreciate them getting all of
the information uh to us for us to be
able to review um
and so the plant material so i'm just
going to go ahead and we can start
looking at
some of the existing photos so this was
the existing house it's a very narrow
lot
and
it has been you know kind of demolished
but it's something to um it really was a
bit of an eyesore the new house i've got
some existing photographs of it it
actually um is much better so just in
terms of context
um there is an existing large tree in
the front that has been maintained this
existing redbud
even without us saying anything brian
was nice enough and actually this has
been relocated to the rear of the lot
and so it was actually preserved so that
was you know that was fantastic
so that is the existing context
then um with the the landscape plan
basically in the rear very little has
been done in the rear so it's an
existing lawn with existing mature trees
and shrubs around the back um the red
bud that was relocated was relocated
basically in about this area
there is going to be sod back up to the
rear elevation as well as solder lawn up
into the side
and then with the front um i was nice
enough to give us a diagram in terms of
what the plant material is here so
there's a concrete porch with a concrete
pathway i do have photographs that will
illustrate this a little bit better
in general there are there's some arbs
that will screen the ac unit
there are
some boxwood and ivy that are along the
front porch with a handful of different
hydrangeas as well as some daylilies to
help kind of soften material up
and then this is the existing plant
material obviously the lawn has not gone
in yet but you can see the um the
hydrangeas and some of the taxes in the
u and the hollies that are in through
here these are the boxwoods
i can get a little bit bigger in through
here on this side and then this side
it's got a pretty large existing
tree a very large existing tree yeah
so just again some more photographs
so you can see
what it looks like
certainly an improvement mr mead thank
you
so do you have
uh anything you would like to share with
us otherwise we will be
you know asking questions or taking
comments
no okay
um are there any questions
mrs williams
yes when i was looking at the plan
um
let's see if elena can go
about ten slots
um on the south side are is there are
you intending to make it have create a
path so that children can run from the
front to the back
of the house on the south side where you
put the used and the
there the hvac system
air conditioning system is no there's
only about seven feet inside you know on
that side over there so no there there's
plenty of access around the other side
great great i was concerned about it
just seems that with the new elevation
of the house the ground level has
been raised
and um i'm concerned about good
neighborhood practices good neighboring
practices that
that there isn't runoff
oh yeah no i've taken care of all that
there's a french drain on the side by
the driveway okay
uh mr mead when i was there today i was
walking along the
uh on the north side and to miss
williams point about the you know the
height of the
of the elevation has been raised it
seemed to me that the driveway is higher
than the dirt we can't soil um on the
north side of the driveway right you
know i don't think we have a picture
probably that goes to the to the north
and that there there's a fall off
a little bit yes you can see the tarp in
the front
do you see that tarp in that picture
there's seven ton of dirt that will be
distributed in those areas to to grade
everything
gently to this okay so so the the area
on the north side of the driveway will
be mitigated to match the elevation of
the neighbors okay
are there other comments
questions
it's no longer there yes when these
pictures were taken it was just the uh
the sump pump was not tied into the
to the discharge
since then the plumbers actually tied
that in so it just drops straight down
into the
water lines that discharge all the water
from the roof drains
is there any um
since
considering they felt kind of filled
with the cracks is there any
replacement
issues with the plantature
existing because we usually have that
with the
i'm sorry what do you mean replacement
were trees taken down oh
no the no that no the only tree that was
taken down was that small red bud and it
was actually relocated to the back
oh yeah i mean landscape yeah i mean in
general i would imagine that your
landscape contractors the plant the
trees and the shrubs are usually
guaranteed for a year perennials are not
guaranteed correct
are there other comments
i am i have a question molly did you
want to say something yeah my only
question is is because this wasn't
reviewed first did you do any tree
protection when this house was built yes
it seems like i don't know how close the
new house is and it's done but
yeah the the new house that's pretty
much where the old house sat so yes we
we protected everything uh if you look
at the drawing that i provided it was
it was fenced off around the um yeah
kind of where it says
existing tree
and then you can see protective fence
line which has now been removed so that
fence line was all around that canopy
and you're not grading on top of those
roots are you i mean filling
yeah okay i think that's the right
answer mr mead no
and that was my comment uh because we
are always wanting to learn about how
effective we are in
in requiring that 10 foot or the the
um the protection line
uh what sort of things
did you run into any problems with tree
roots or
no no good
now since the existing foundation is in
that old picture can
you know testify
the root system didn't go kind of than
where we were doing the digging very
good
thank you when i was looking today i
mean the beauty of that lot is to me
it's so deep
yeah there's a there's a lot of room in
the back and
and as you've heard in our discussions
we're always thoughtful about canopy and
trying to improve our canopy and um
we can't make you put or suggest you put
any tree canopy in you know maple or oak
or
an elm tree but i think it would be a
wonderful addition to the backyard so
it's just
a suggestion to consider
and um i will and i will defer to boxes
right and
we have tree giveaways in april so that
might be a time to apply for a tree and
see what it does to the backyard
again just a suggestion are there any
other comments
and i'll take a motion
yep mr wilson i move to approve the plan
as presented
is there a second
i second it okay are there any comments
okay emotions been made and seconded
that we approve the plan as presented
all those in favor say aye aye almost
close same sign okay motion carries so
plan is accepted thank you for coming
thank you thank you for coming
thank you and then as far as
the
permit procedure goes do you just give
the okay i mean i have i brought in the
actual permit if somebody wants to sign
that tonight so i will i will send you
and i'll load it up into viewpoint um
sort of the findings of fact and then
it'll be approved in the computer
um on viewpoint and then we'll be good
to go so there's no signature needed
here no not there nope okay
thank you thank you thank you
all right
all right mayor it's your turn
um we're ready for the mayor's report
i'm i'm
i'm looking forward to giving it so
um
like a bridge don't quicken okay uh so
dgb kind of spark yes
uh we have an ordinance before council
to make sure the funding can be
appropriated so we can get going on that
but uh we received a grant from the back
to community foundation so that was
very kind and generous of them
is that my update i think that's the
update we're looking for there yes it
was all about funding so we could have a
start date it's all about the benjamins
for grant right and i'm sure i've
mentioned this before but it's the
denison very blank tree fund that is
underwriting the installation of the
kindness park which is terrific actually
another thing about it we just
did we suspended out that i can't
remember what last night so i'm still a
little tired from our council me that
went really late last night
it's a little blurry in my head why was
that was it long it's just budget oh
yeah that is sleepy stuff no it's
exciting exciting and long
um so bridge over alum creek at astor uh
celeste will be saddened to hear is a is
not and in fact a truck bridge it is a
pedestrian bike bridge
um in fact
i uh
see if i can get a way to get this up on
the screen easily
i was going through um
can i borrow the laptop
please
i hate navigating this thing i'm so bad
at it
let me show you how to use our website
here
i was going through
our plans studies for something i was
working on
in the alma creek bridge and i got to
the
2011 bexley land use strategy
which uh
was
if you look
through this document you will see a
photo of larry hellman
was he younger then
10 years
where is he
there look at that turtleneck
but he's kind of like this is good
that's not even really why i was sending
you there
what i wanted you to see was the larry
hellman napkin sketch
this is an lh original if i recall am i
right
indeed show us what i can do with
colored pencils and uh at aster avenue
he shows a bridge come across which so
we've talked over the years since then
about where does that bridge go
and i totally forgot about the exhibit
because at one point in time we're
talking maybe it's up here and you know
and it would come back to here we've
come back right to square one right
where we're right where larry hellman
started us off do we want to pull up the
exhibits at all that we did or no yeah
i'm trying to remember where i have i
have so one decade later
and that section of album creek isn't
doesn't have any troubled waters does it
yeah
no but uh
i like where your head's at there
um
i'm going to try to
send something over to
to uh
eleanor over there
that's the one
so the bridge
uh elena has done an exhibit for it
we've applied for a grant for
both the state capital
fund and also
a uh
also a uh podium r grant um
and
clean ohio
no you know putting our uh
different okay
remember
lwcf yeah
land and water land and water
conservation
so
the alignment here would
uh sort of
if you can see that would you like to
have the lights off no i'm
that's actually a sewer truck so it's
still misleading but that's like the
sledding hill um
at schneider park
so the boardwalk is right here so it's
right before the boardwalk you would
have crossed the bridge
and then um it would hook into the
multi-use track
trail
andrew village park vehicular entrance
is right here and that's the new
hawk
uh crossing there at allen creek and
there's this gorgeous sycamore right
there this thing is a granddad sycamore
it's so sweet like seven or eight feet
yeah yeah except multiple malta
uh
no no single step and then i mean
obviously it branches up a little bit
further but at the base
yeah so it's really cool um so we
thought that could be kind of a nice
highlight of the bridge right there but
so we're trying to get funding for that
um
got something else to
any questions about that just kind of an
update where we're at
um
our city engineer has it quoted as an
ebay deck which i think is a real
excessive uh concept so probably will
not end up with
brazilian walnut decking but
nonetheless
yeah you know ben the only other comment
about that from those of you that
bike the yam creek trail
getting on that trail
from central back it's a little
complicated i mean because you don't
like the main street crossing you know
kroger's that's a mess because that's a
pretty active signal livingston is worse
living's a disaster to get across um
so you know it's it's at least here
you're partially on you still have to do
the livingston thing but i mean it's a
uh it gets some nice safe access to the
bikeway for folks yeah forever for
central and south right yeah
so
so you had mentioned before that the
look of it might be similar to the saint
charles bridge
yes it's
yeah most likely a trust a trust bridge
so it's uh
lots of ways they look they're good
okay
there are there are some programs that
you can
where bridges are being dismantled you
can pick up
this library yes you can get used
bridges too yeah
there's an idea the cost of the project
the bridges it's really not a big
savings it's just if you want in this
history and and and that's
transportation as well reduce reuse yeah
recycle that's a great idea molly
okay um
and then in the in our budget we're
uh working on putting some money
together for
potential right-of-way improvements
along with avenue
and
we
have puts money in our budget for the
commonwealth
plan to get started with we've already
we have funding for the west athletic
fields
and in our current budget proposal we
have funding to build out the restrooms
and the equipment
uh on commonwealth which is uh brian
kick and jones is developing
more
detailed schematics with his folly
concept which is a you know
very high quality architecturally
consistent with homes in the area
concept for the for the park
and we also have funding in the budget
for the east fields so
they would kind of follow each other you
wouldn't want to do both at once because
you don't want them both down at the
same time but
having those buildings in place allows
us to store the mechanicals necessary
for the field irrigation
in a way that is not a huge eyesore to
the park because otherwise i think we're
talking like
this tall
this long electric surface water works
so there's a booster pump that's about
three feet by four feet by three feet
tall
um a big giant box um and that you know
then there's also going to need to be a
backflow uh preventer that we're trying
to get inside and so rather than having
these kind of just things sitting in the
landscape and painting them for screen
and hoping that they go away we're
trying to actually put them in a
building
and then on the opposite side have a
matching footprint that can be a
single-use restroom
and so we can get rid of the
port-a-potty
i know it's so pretty we can use the
enclosure somewhere else we totally
could bring it down to schneider best
enclosure in town
um we also have money proposed for the
havenwood park landscape installation
for next year
those are all in the budget
i'd love to hear that the other thing i
wanted to talk about
go back to
i'm sorry this is a little bit of a
presentation here but um our drexel uh
improvement concepts
have been advancing and
[Music]
last night at council meeting
talked a little bit about that i have
some exhibits that are really
i think council didn't really care about
but i know you guys will find them
interesting
uh which is
as we've worked on
um different concepts sort of where
we're looking what we're kind of looking
at for drexel at this point is
i think i said at a recent treat
permission the medians
wouldn't work because of the width of
the street right
and so we're looking at um
bump outs at the intersections
to sort of narrow the street at key
intersections and provide
safer crossing opportunities and
you know these sorry this is not the
perfect way to show this to you but i
don't have the actual electronic exhibit
but if you squint
you can kind of see the idea that you
know here this is so for example this is
bexley park and you're seeing how a
crosswalk uh to the other side is now
a pedestrian going across uh 25 feet as
opposed to 40 feet
and
visible to traffic not being hidden by
any vehicles so it'll make the mid-block
crossings a lot safer and you can see
some scribbling going on because what
we're doing is we're
making sure that we're extracting
extracting as much bump out area as we
can given the conditions um at the
different intersections along the street
and there are areas where medians
as you saw this is uh
this is at st albans actually
so
you know for example we noted that we
would want some handicap spaces for the
church
but
there's a lot of opportunity for some
um
widening of the green space narrowing of
the street
and the median that could be
accommodated where we don't have the
need for turn motions
is about a five foot medium
similar in geometry to what we see at
the neighborhood launch in gay street
downtown
so if you guys have seen that those are
gorgeous medians
they're very structured and that's the
sort of conversation i know you guys are
gonna want to dig into later right now
we're just talking two-dimensional we'll
start talking three-dimensional but you
can do a lot within that space and still
have to be a really impactful
there aren't that many opportunities for
them along drexel
but there are some and they can enhance
the
program
and then this would just be lawn just
because we have the we already have the
maples already planted
yeah they would just have a wider tree
line with stuff in front of it grant
said you could just kind of move
[Laughter]
[Music]
yeah that's up to you guys to figure out
what it's going to be space right it's
it's more greenery
astroturf definitely yes
something vertical would be great i
understand we already have that um
but yeah i think
it'll maybe that's a long-term plan and
maybe something but just just bringing
the green
closer together
minimizes the pavement and the and kind
of so the eye sees green to green uh and
even if it's just lawn it'll be a major
difference anytime you can replace
obviously pavement with green and narrow
the pavement impact you it's a home run
what about flashing lights
more flashing lights now so dale and uh
and
there are our two
uh schools priority classes so they have
the beacons they would be so that's it
yeah okay
the beacons are going where so the
typology here is the hierarchy hierarchy
the hierarchy is the
beacon production
but pedestrian actuated us crossings
are areas where
you can
get most of the population to safely
cross for school so there's
it's a highlighted intersection it's you
know we don't want to pepper them all
over the city because it's really
designed to
be an extra safe crossing for for kids
so everybody see them
there is a logic to why they're at that
place and not somewhere else because you
can funnel most of traffic pedestrian
traffic to that area
for a safer crossing
they've been needed for a long time
and
any questions for the mayor on this and
the speed limit goes down to 25 that's
the big one so the speed limit is 35
right uh
we can get it down to 25 if people start
driving slower
people start driving slower it's three
changes so it's a chicken and egg sure
um there are some potential changes and
some transportation builds that might
allow us to expedite that a little bit
but we're
you know we're working within the odot
framework for determining speed based
upon ohio code yep
yeah well one more thing we'll see we'll
look at this in detail but one of the
things that we looked at also is just
relocating the there's a the crosswalk
we added at sherwood and drexel uh to
get people safely across
it's still a little pinched and it's a
little unsafe just because of the amount
of cars all around
so we're looking at moving that a little
bit south to
right in front of the the apartment the
gay street apartment complex it's north
of the alley you know
between that and art access basically
with maybe a little bit of a bump out
there as well so it gives pedestrians
more visibility and you're not right
yeah that nice thing with the bump outs
right now you have to the the first
eight feet of movement across the street
uh is
going by the front of our front or back
of a car right and it's very difficult
to be seen so when the bump outs occur
and you have the walkways there's more
visibility being seen from up and down
the street
exactly
they also present you know an
opportunity for our engineer to add more
to storm catch basins so that's fine
and mayor you had
suggested at one time that when you
touch a street you try and do everything
on the street
that's possible
[Music]
you heard that right grant
okay thank you good
so mayor so on the the storm sewers on
the corners they all moved on
yeah um
it depends so
it's actually
i have to remember i can't remember what
they told me but in some of these
situations
it's it's fairly simple just based on
where the ball is
um as you get
i can't remember
but as you get
closer past powell it's either harder or
easier so that's really helpful feedback
i just gave you okay but those are the
sorts of things we're considering we do
have a budget for
storm work um
but
again the the qual that's the important
qualifier of all of this
we're writing we know we're drawing all
the stuff out and then the price tags
come back so to the extent that
sewer work gets added to every one of
these that we do that does
important well
you have anything else you'd like to
share with us today um i'm sure i do
good
other mother the other the great the
great catch basin other was the budget
so anything else that you guys have
questions about
when is the uh saint charles broad
street median going to be finished up
that's grant's report you're talking to
the wrong person about that
i i said to grant i would email dave
coke and ask them when the street lights
are supposed to come in and and december
december was the answer okay there has
been i know that this is true of course
everyone has this excuse but there has
been a
difficulty getting streetlights because
of the uh all the shipping cargo supply
inventory stuff people have had
they're sitting in a
ship outside of l.a it's such a
convenient excuse
i don't think it's all bad to have the
medium unfinished with all the orange
barrels in it because i think it kind of
like training behavior people will
understand there's a medium there now
right and and and that you know they
won't drive into it
and
i don't know if this is in grants update
either but he's been doing some amazing
work on the schneider trail connection
at main street so
uh
is that on your report
so check it out okay
yeah if anybody hasn't walked that path
uh that's a that's just a wonderful
wonderful path down there it's great all
the way from the community gardens down
through and you know it you get what
maybe a third of the way to maine
um and then it kind of goes to it's a
little rugged um but you can still do it
but uh but the paved part is just
terrific it's not real good anymore
is it right
after the web no no no
okay okay
all right
okay any questions for the mayor
well then mayor we will move along thank
you thank you staff report elena do you
have anything you would like to share
with us tonight i do
um
a couple of things one
we are going to be working with
donald molly's wonderful husband he has
graciously agreed to help me
um do some of the staff reviews of the
installation for the landscape um i am
woefully behind in doing that i've just
been too busy um and so uh
he's you know trained as a landscape
architect
does he it's a degree in horticulture
and horticulture he was in landscape
park okay left and went got a degree in
heart so he knows plants he can read
plans and so he will be able to go
through and kind of you know do the walk
through and make sure our things you
know basically are they installed per
plan
he'll understand that if they're six box
woods instead of seven if it looks okay
that we're not going to ding them but if
something is not planted at all that we
need to flag it so we're going to be
getting some additional help on that so
that is exciting for me
the other thing i wanted to just mention
there have been a handful of staff
approvals
on
if there's some small landscape in front
of a fence or
if there's a small thing for instance
there's going to be over on main street
right by penn station subs there's going
to be a new cajun
restaurant that is going in there um and
so we've been working with them to say
could you put some pots out front to
make it prettier can you actually
improve the landscape there there's some
spots for some trees you need to fix the
tax taxes they've agreed to that it's
going to happen in the spring but
they're just some things like that and
so there are a couple things that
doesn't necessarily have to come before
tree commission but where we can with
some of the commercial projects we're
trying to get them to
put pots in make things look a little
bit better
um
the thing that i wanted to share with
you all that i think is the the most
important in terms of
me learning this role and trying to make
sure that we're you know i'm helpful and
that we're not allowing things to fall
through the cracks similar like what we
had with 235 north roosevelt um
i am now going to be meeting with kathy
um
the tuesday after each arb meeting and
that we will go through
all of the different projects and see if
there's any landscape component that we
that i need to be aware of whether it's
a new build or if it's a fence or if
it's a variance or something like that
um just so
because i mean i haven't you know after
they you know i don't pay attention to
the arb and the city councils i'm not
reading through the agendas and looking
at their findings of facts and so just
being able to sit down so that i can get
a sense of what are the projects that
are upcoming as well as have an
opportunity to review site plans with
her that she might not be able to
understand quite as well and say hey
have you thought about this
so um we are we're going to be doing
that we did this this past tuesday it
was very helpful there are a handful of
new builds that are coming up
um there is we found out that saint
charles has done a parking lot expansion
that we haven't reviewed yet and so
we're able to flag that so
now on the east side of the building um
they are planning a convention a
convocation center um as well as a
parking lot expansion
west side thank you the west side um and
so something that i've already reached
out to the architects that to say hey we
need to be able to review the landscape
just so we can have the right hand
talking to the left hand
also along those lines
we have created a new application
online that then goes into viewpoint for
a new build landscape residential
application so rather than just having a
commercial and then rather than having
residential we're having something that
says if it's a new build so it can
actually have all of those information
the material in it and we've decided
that after a project
if there's a project that the arb has
approved for demolition they have three
to four months
i was saying four ben was saying three
um for them to turn in a landscape plan
for approval oftentimes people don't
want to go through the expense of
preparing a landscape plan while because
they don't know if the architecture is
going to be approved they kind of you
know fuss around with the site and the
architect is like i'll put a tree here
um but then at least when people know
still in that early planning stages of
the arb has approved it okay now that
kicks into a clock where the the tree
commission you have to submit your
landscape plans so that we don't have
some of the things that we're running
into for instance the project you know
on broad street where we just can't get
the landscape plan in and it's
just you know waiting and waiting and
waiting so slowly i think we're getting
a better process together um and just
wanted to kind of share that with you in
terms of their we're trying to do some
behind-the-scenes stuff with staff that
we can make sure that
we don't you know look like we don't
know what we're doing i said to elena
the other day do you ever wake up in the
middle of the night wondering what this
group did before you got there
[Laughter]
she does she does wake up nice so any
questions for elena
if not grant
let's let's hear about what you're doing
um
i guess i'm going to have a busy year
with all the new park stuff
the fall tree planting as far as i know
that should be
in progress
and also putting up holiday lights
and
acid damage planting uh yard barbers is
doing that i'm assuming it should be
done in next few weeks the crab apples
are all in we're just waiting for the
oak trees
um you're thinking of the crab apples
and um grants
france work really getting this this
project in in a short period of time
have you had any feedback from the group
of residents that were concerned about
the safety
yeah so we've received really i've
received several pieces of very positive
feedback about the tree plantings um
and just being pleased with the
uh comprehensiveness of the plantings
i've heard some people being
upset about the fact that they're crab
apples but
i i weren't they like some we did
special variation we we did
uh first degree on the hawthorns
but come to find out the nurseries
weren't planting them anymore because
they were not a good street tree um
they didn't do well on the street
so that's why we went with the uh
the crab apples they had the numbers
that we had and these are more of an
upright
uh they are not going to fan out they do
uh are supposed to be tolerant to any
diseases leap diseases and stuff like
that so
you mean a notice
or to explain what's right okay
everybody thinks the ones in trouble
no i don't think we did no we did not
could you do that at the end of the
project did you you know thanking
everybody for
you know just a summary to like just say
we've now completed the project and
this is about the crab
here's the old name so everybody has the
same information
i'll write the letter for you grant
how's that sounds good okay
and you know happy new year yeah right
okay
um anything else grant um the
maintenance plan for the wall hardscapes
you know i've spoke to uh
the gentleman you get ian i am
um he also agrees that it's kind of a
one-time thing it's not something that
we need to keep coming back and doing
year after year so
um
we'll work with him to get that done
and the google docs so i guess we susan
and i discuss potentially next year also
doing another tree walk and seeing where
the trees that we did in fill in your
locations and if you feel that there
should be more trees in filled in and
those same locations and possibly
handing out ipads so we could all have
the same
google doc
format yeah now that i think grant how
many trees will be planted is it 300 is
that the number uh the total of 300 100
which of which were replacements of
trees removed in 19 and
20 and then 200 of the trees that were
planted were of your guys's choosing
okay
so i said to grant now that we've done
this once you know what would you think
about us going back out because i know
there was some confusion about how far
away to stay from a stop sign you know
the the water lines in
grant's comment was that would be fine
but if we could all use the same
program it would make his work so much
better
and so we'd all have ipads with the with
the google spreadsheet on it and we'd be
able to input so then grant has one
master
copy is not going through and
i think he said each one of us used a
different system to tally our trees
so no it's not it's not efficient and
it's not nice yeah
great idea yeah
so
um
you know we can and then if we all do
the same streets that we did before
we'll have some sense of you know
were the trees planted are there enough
trees or did they did this get missed
because we aren't using all the same
program
any comments on that
i think it's a great idea okay
well so grant let's uh let's see how
many ipads we can get and get the
program on it we can do that and i also
have comments from last from because i
did take all your addresses and put them
on a google sheet you know oh good
and gave a reason why it could get a
reason why it could not be planned okay
so we could have that information oh
that's great okay
so
you could do that anytime i guess
how many ipads do you have
i have four
currently in my staff but i know this we
have some in city hall
ipads
i don't know okay well anyway we got
four so we can start someone can start
and then we'll see how we do so any
other questions for grant excuse me
though wouldn't would be best if we did
it in the spring when we're not confused
whether or not a tree is dead or
probably okay
you can't you just intro with that
celeste i do not have that kind of inner
knowledge
okay let's go on to old business okay
okay did you have something ellen what
are you doing under old business okay
uh naming rights study group jim wilson
is chairing this um this group and made
really good progress yeah we um we were
honored to have the mayor join the
naming rights group as well as mike
price and i think we made substantial
progress towards
sort of the final parameters of a policy
that was what about two weeks ago that
the mayor joined us and i have done
nothing with the policy since then um
but we'll um hopefully very soon revise
the policy in a way that reflects the
input of the mayor and um
and mike price and the rest of the
committee so we will
i think we're i think the conclusion was
that it ultimately needs to be presented
to uh city council um
and so
we'll pro we will undoubtedly bring the
policy to this group and to the parks
and rex board
for comment and hopefully support before
that happens i
can't promise that you can celebrate the
holidays by reviewing that policy but
we'll do our best
so and then let's go on to the uh jim's
the urban tree canopy assessment
assignments and see
well because i lost so much sleep
thinking about revising the naming
policy i neglected to remind everyone to
give me their feedback on your
assignments and so i'll send an email
out after this meeting
larry did find a really
nice
website with policy that i think
i challenge everyone to beat the
usefulness of larry's sight um not to
add to larry's ego but um
i mean if if all we get out of this is
what larry found it's been a useful
exercise in terms of getting additional
ideas so i'll send a reminder out and if
we have time at the next meeting maybe
we can yeah
um it has it does has anybody looked at
their cities and have copies of what i
felt was really valuable information
so i'll give you a copy and you can um
enjoy it over thanksgiving
you can chat about it okay very
insightful points
to not only the environment but our
health
it would be pretty much the same note
yeah dave wakeman you may not know about
this little but do you know about this
sort of work okay
i got an email about it
yeah but we'll tell you now we'll tell
you now just this is sort of like medial
learning
uh jim chose let's see uh
14 cities
and then and um
who have canopy covers that are better
than ours or at least similar and then
he assigned all of us to
cities to review and your two cities are
horn lake mississippi horn lake
mississippi and woodenville washington
w-o-o-d-i-n-v-i-l-l-e
um does anybody has anybody done a quick
review i know and and had some takeaways
right away larry just a couple on the um
these things are always they've got two
sides to them so uh the city of davidson
north carolina davidson uh college is
its own arboretum so they're very tree
focused very tree um and the
the section uh is really pretty tight in
terms of what it requires including you
cannot take down a 12-inch tree without
a permit
um
so then the other side of the equation
is to call them and to talk to like the
planner and talk through this and so
forth
and and then so how many of these uh
permits have you issued well uh we're
just and what you discover is
maybe then this is not for anybody to go
calling up the north carolina guy and
embarrassing him but the um
it's one thing to have an ordinance it's
another thing to put it in play and to
see how it's working so that part seems
to be the
falling behind let's say
so so in other words you've gotten a
good ordinance passed by the council
but maybe the city folks and the so
forth aren't actually pushing it very
hard and so not a whole lot's happening
so that's the other side of the equation
i looked at tupelo mississippi and i was
amazed at the detail in their code and i
was saying to elena and the
mayor and larry when
we started setting up for the meeting
that they have coverage i mean they have
tables with how much tree coverage you
have to have in a lot right you know if
it's this large lot then you have to
have this much and they they describe
every single the caliper of every single
tree that goes in two inches three
inches six inches
and
and to your point it's great because you
don't have to you don't have to have any
meetings about what the expectations are
what the follow-through is
might be a question i haven't called it
no that's that's a big issue because
obviously the more requirements that you
have to require checking the more
staffing period and so if the staff's
not there if they don't have a real
forestry or urban forestry uh staff of
some kind then you know is the same guy
who's doing zoning code reviews and
counting parking spaces having to turn
around and do the tree stuff so
that it's it is both sides of the
equation but we'll come back and talk
more with
with more information um in december so
i i'd like to add one thing that when i
was looking for other committees like
ours that would parallel in another city
i couldn't find anything but i just had
to keep on searching and looking
underneath rocks
and then wow there was a big bloom that
came up that had even four different
suggestions of drawings and they name
they they uh number
the kind of drawings that they were kind
of density and implants that they
inquire of people
which
is really helpful in in conveying
somebody who doesn't want to
doesn't know what they're doing can you
use that as an example right so there
we're not going to talk about it today
but
you've got a little bit of an overview
okay okay
um
larry you were gonna if eleanor can pull
up the cassidy and fifth avenue
improvements right if that's we got the
plan i hope yeah we do all right a
little foggy a little fuzzy but does
that
can that be
hopefully uh well that looks a little
challenging
yeah i know
that may be uh it may not be
blowable uppable
well
uh
just quick background um
so they had their final uh webex
review of their preferred alternative
this uh this last november the ninth
um
and uh what happens now
is for the next 16 months
uh will be the acquisition phase the
acquisition negotiation phase so that
will run through april of 2023
following that construction would start
in august of 2024
or 2023
uh and would take through december of
2024 so 17-month
construction process
uh i think as as we've talked about many
times before
the acquisition would include the reuben
building at the southwest corner of
fifth and cassidy uh that goes i don't
know if they would try to do a partial
on that would make no sense
and then on the
north east corner of fifth and cassidy
right there
both apartment buildings and the little
repair shop on the corner go that gets
converted into a retention basin so it
turns green
uh the drive the
the the north extension beyond fifth you
see skews a little bit to the right
that's so that the
required you know it's a it's a thick
amount of stuff in the right of way you
gotta have the green space multi-youth
path three lanes a sidewalk on this side
tree line on the other side and so it
comes very near so you'll be able to
bike right past the steps of the church
i mean right there so hopefully when
they come out of the church they won't
get hit with bikes but that's the way
that goes is on the left-hand side right
right yeah and so is the ball i used
path so that's the 10-foot path goes
right back by their steps
but they tried very hard of course not
to
uh take the church because that would
have been a that would have been a tough
thing to do landscaping is is is there
in place uh the only two
issues well
there are more than that but the i did
hear the word cobraheads used which i
thought we put a stake through the heart
of that thing but that was used and of
course the whole meeting is just wildly
contingent language well we're still
looking at that we're still doing this
you know and i think they'll do that
until it opens up and the other issue
for those of you have been traveling
cassidy's last two days and having to do
the northview
bypass
uh the the
uh very major concern with the residents
of northview before this happened of
course that north would have used as a
bypass so bingo here we go
and um so they had traffic diverted onto
whatever the first street is margaret
and then over two blocks to northview
and then up but of course there's nobody
at fifth and northview
uh to guard traffic to try to make a
left turn to go to the freeway and that
i'll tell you yesterday that was just
murder absolute murders cars are
screeching it's
amazing that people survived that so
uh the operational plan has
has yet to be determined as what gets
closed down how and how they how they're
going to handle traffic because those
northwood people are going to have a
mess on their hands i already do is
there any leverage we have for um
changing out the cobra headlights is it
something like the eight four lights
they're using downtown
yeah i mean
at this point uh it's i think
we know we talked to them they talked
about using the regular fixtures the
pictures we like right cassidy i don't
know if they're talking specifically on
fifth uh but there's there's
they know our concerns okay but we have
to kind of stay on that a little bit can
we count on you to do that i i have not
taken it i've not talked to kevin thomas
or the guys about that and uh you know
we'll have to figure out how to
pedal this day they know what we want
okay they know okay any questions for
larry
so
um
grant was kind enough to
underwrite the cost of our membership in
hugsy that says the planet geohuxy
partnership hugsy stands for it's not a
touchy feely thing husqvarna urban green
space index
and it's a thousand dollar membership
that we pay once and then we never have
to pay again and every year they do a
green index for us that's both canopy
and green space
and comparison with 122 other cities in
the world the 122 cities are have a
total of 600 million people
and the other cities are able to access
our information and we're able to access
their information so
it's a chance for
us to have a worldwide presence
if uh you know if we have the time to
take
you know to make use of this so is that
go going forward grant
um
but when they do we're ready yeah
yeah but we're ready okay
any other old business
ellen i have a question and
for the mayor and i guess grant uh part
of the trees for bexley projects of this
you know this past year
were the replacement of the trees on
north parkview in front of jeffrey
mansion
but we kind of delayed that
looking at
underground
bearing the wires yeah yeah to bury the
wires
and i was wondering where we were on
that
our service director is looking into
that
okay
[Applause]
well
you know i mean
he's also looking into drexel
bearing the lines on something
oh that's so good you know this is a pet
project of mine anyway
i want to start this as as you might
guess the lines on
parkview in front of the mansion would
determine what tree is chosen so we've
delayed yesterday
but it was part of the project so yeah
the lines aren't going to be buried but
have a you know short trees
if you're buried then we have and it
would be wonderful to fit stately trees
yeah right yeah i know i know that andy
is asking those questions okay great
okay
so we'll have to hope that the woman who
was a potential donor a year ago will
still be alive kind of like the cassidy
project yeah
well the people that are interested
still be alive
yeah okay under new business um i would
just wanted to ask you know last month's
meeting was a challenge and was thinking
about how we could improve
those kind of discussions with residents
and maybe we can and maybe we can't and
other tools we as a commission could use
um for more control in a more even and
particip
participatory discussion so
yeah in uh you know at midnight the
night after the meeting i realized i
could have adjourned the meeting and
then reopened it which would have been a
great cooling off period
um the mayor had suggested a tool just
how to take a recess you know kind of
like a time out which would have also
been you know
probably effective
um i didn't know if other people had
other other thoughts you know as i think
about how we can
do better
well
yeah
i mean i i think that is uh
that's certainly going to be an action
that the city takes
letting people notify but the results
may not be any different people will
just know
earlier rather than later that they're
getting a tree so those kind of
discussions
um what might still happen
and to clarify
by mail
yeah
right so
um
you know it was it was you know it's
just a chance for us to reflect on just
doing better
finding other other ways to communicate
to have more balanced discussion to have
more participation from commission
members and
um and ways that we can control the
discussion better
so any suggestions
yeah i do think and and i'll leave this
to uh to bend and our our legal counsel
uh but how how near we should be to what
the other commissions do when we're
proving things
you know finding a fact a reading of the
finding of the fact uh does the
applicant understand the finding in fact
sounds like a lot of formal stuff and
maybe some of that we don't need to deal
with uh but when we're approving
official city plans
a little different than maybe talking to
the folks here uh whether we need to
have and there are sheets on that you
know this is
one two three four five six seven uh so
i just wonder before we're told to do
that should we be doing that
um
and and you know the order of things too
you know staff sets it up and then it's
the applicant and so forth and um
maybe we don't but i just raise that as
a as a question as a good practice
yes or mr wilson
well um i
don't know if our process allows it
although i assume it does i mean we sort
of put
um
complaints about what grant wants to do
under public comments and and maybe it
should instead
be a request for action from citizens
because i think
when you say public comment you sort of
leave the impression that the person
sort of like city council gets to speak
and respond and that's a frankly a big
issue the city council is constantly
wrestling with and criticized for
so i wonder whether structuring a little
differently and saying you know requests
for
modification of and then
structure it more like we do the
applications for a landscaping plan give
the you know applicant
a reasonable time to present their
position and then simply ask them to sit
down and allow discussion
um
might create more control because it did
turn into more of a dialogue with these
folks and they were somewhat insistent
on dialogue but if you're sitting down
it's a lot harder to sort of continue to
engage in this island could you see
having an application for that process
so that you know
the best word i can think of is an
appeal they're appealing a decision that
that we've made feel of a decision we've
made that we've made so i could see
maybe you know an application much like
the applications that are filled out for
um approval of the landscape plan
yeah i i i could see that i'm
a little reluctant there because i guess
i'm i don't want there to be a
presumption that
you know everyone that's sort of got
minor indigestion about a tree being
planted in their tree lawn
gets
you know a big process and so that my
concern about my own suggestion is let's
not turn it into a bigger process but
maybe a little more structure like larry
was talking about where they get their
chance to present um
understanding that we've already
approved it
and they're asking us to amend prior
approval and then ask them to sit down
and if we have to be consistent i think
we could actually do that in many
instances with the applicants once
for landscaping plans you could simply
say okay has everyone concluded any
questions with the applicants
thank you you can sit down and now we'll
have discussion if necessary by the
commission
and i think they're really that's a
really great suggestion i think the the
distinction that you made as well is
that you know it's not an appeal because
it's not your property
and so when you when you
when you that's the difference between
an appeal for an arb b's app decision
when it's a
decision reflecting that person's
property so you almost create this
false expectation that
they're coming in to talk about their
property when when they're not they're
talking about city property that they
live next to and it's understandable you
know it impacts their
potentially impacts their their property
but it's not it's not technically their
property so what's the right verb then
it's not appeal it's exactly what jim
said
[Laughter]
well
i mean
i think that today was a you know i
think the difference would be
today's model worked well it was
conversational but it also requires
mutual respect and i think it's kind of
interesting because what
you guys have experienced right now is
exactly why a council came up with some
restrictions on a back and forth uh
public comment piece now having said
that it still happens all the time
but there are you know there are when it
gets into a debate type
you know you start to
start to feel your blood pressure going
up a little bit you know that you've
entered into the wrong you know side of
that policy
and that's when the council president
shuts down that sort of interchange so
questions are fine answers are fine but
when it gets into this back and forth
you know that's not the purpose of
of these sorts of meetings but um sorry
i was that's a tan that's change angel
no i mean it's all good we can only do
better
you can call whatever you want
discussion
um presentation presentation
yeah
i think it just needs to be communicated
just like uh you guys did the sewers
cleaning up
i mean did i complain that i had a
toilet overflowing my basement and then
i had water spraying out of my oh dear
that sounds like you are it sounds like
you're complaining right now dave
actually um
i do have one thing to think about and
be cautious about that i heard
um and it's this is not a criticism it's
just something that i observed and i and
i saw and that is um
we
one of the strengths of our community is
how long people live in it or how
multi-generational they might be
but it's also language that can be used
to make people feel like they're an
outsider if they're not
and so one of the questions that was
asked was how you know it was it was
kind of a joke and i understand it but
like how long have you lived here and
then
an applicant tried to make a big deal
about how well they had lived here a
long time and maybe they were
multi-generational
and i think that that there is that has
no bearing whatsoever on a determination
at any zoning or anything at all
and i think by reinforcing that even if
it's done in the most innocent way and i
i believe it was by reinforcing that
you sort of perpetuate this expectation
that there's an inside and outside club
in bexley and that's something we hear a
lot about from new residents so just
something to think about and be aware of
we've
i've started when we have like meetings
like you know workshops or whatever i've
started banning people saying how long
they've lived in bexley because it just
turns into this
it turns into this it's great it's
really cool but it also turns into thing
where the you know someone goes like i
haven't been here two years and some
people like i've been into here two
years that's great and other people feel
left out like their voice doesn't matter
so just something to think about
again an aside
but something that i think we should all
be a little bit
cognizant of as we as we talk about it
yeah good point good point other things
i mean there's a problem with that
i mean he was
dealing with
somebody
who was just coming out to do
their job and he became so offensive
right the other thing that i i thought
about is that um in our conversation
last month uh
both husband and wife came up and i'm
thinking that was a liability that one
person at the time
or i mean if
if both people need to speak one person
at a time or you we just appoint one
person from the two or three that could
speak
but not to have a group
discussion
i think that that would have been
helpful if we'd just had one person i
mean is there any anybody feel any
takeaways on that that i i would i would
be offended if if i was with my
significant other and they said you you
know you can speak and you can't right i
mean i think saying it one at a time is
fine that you can't have multiple people
at the podium
but i don't think that
it makes sense to say okay well the wife
can speak and the husband can't speak i
mean
you know i can understand a time limit i
can understand one at a time but
designating that you know
i mean maybe we say that there's a
maximum of five people can speak at the
on the topic but i don't think that you
can prevent one person from voicing
their opinion because
they might think that what you know
their partner said was wrong and they
wanted to say their own thing um
that that's just me i mean i i know that
i would be mad if someone said that you
know
you live here there but you can't speak
your husband has to talk
yeah or vice versa i mean i i would echo
what ellen has said and also i think
um in terms of relations with the
community the worst thing i think you
can sort of hear in terms of feedback is
they wouldn't even let me speak i think
that um
that people outside the meeting hear
that and they feel like there's
something unfair
okay what about just one time at the
podium and then the husband comes first
yep
i think that's totally fine
yeah i think this stuff exists on a
continuum
uh if you've got something to where you
got 20 people in the room and they're
all on the same issue then you kind of
have to go to the max rolls you know
you're going to have to have time limits
you're going to have to do this you have
to do that because your goal is to say
we need as many people
to contribute this as possible so the
other part of that is if somebody has
all already covered what you're
concerned with say i agree with them and
let somebody else speak so it's so it's
about taking information
and being heard uh but not just being
hurt and so that becomes important if
it's just one couple that there and it
gets a little outrageous then as it gets
outrageous you have to tighten up the
standards
you know kind of as it's going along um
but i kind of agree that if we can be
generally friendly about this stuff so
we don't look like we're big government
that's probably helpful
as long as we don't raise the legal
issue we are treating people differently
um
from one occasion to the next i mean i
know when we started on arb and you know
all sudden we had to do all this you
know the friendly part kind of
disappeared uh because it's like you
know the finding of acts
you know it all had to be kind of nailed
down and and letter of the law kind of
thing and maybe that's fine because
that's a lot of those things are
controversial
but boy i sure opt for friendliness if
we can get away with it for a while
any other thoughts
you can
okay well
okay well we'll work on some sort of
protocol or procedure so that we can
look at it next time and all agree on it
well and i think susan i wasn't here
unfortunately last month i missed the
fireworks um
but i i liked your introduction that you
said that you said hey this is this is
what we're expecting and we expect you
to be civil and cordial and you know i
mean i think setting that and and if we
have to have that and just like if
that's just if i wrote we say that every
single time it sets an expectation of
like hey we expect this but also
we're going to be paying attention you
know they all of a sudden you know it's
like all of a sudden you know that okay
this isn't a substitute teacher that i
can get away with
right this is someone who actually you
know we're going to be looking at this
and so i mean i i thought that that was
very helpful what you did it was very
brief and
i thought that you know both of them
were clearly you know neither of them
wanted trees but they weren't
irate about it i mean right and mrs
liska i think from him
that you know backed off a little
because of what she's already heard
learned
i think she really i'm not like him so
yeah
well
it's all about the order and the agenda
so
so arbor day is coming up in five months
april 29 2022
just around the corner
spring planting and i looked in my notes
and last december 13th i think it was we
had our first arbor day committee
meeting by zoom
so for those of you who would like to be
on the arbor day committee this year
just let me know
and
celeste will have more installations in
the ferry village
grant and sam are and
well perhaps susan work on a little bit
better
application program for the tree
giveaway
so that um
we don't have people applying for trees
and we've run out of the supply and then
they don't want the tree to get so
it'll it'll all be good yeah
and um we didn't see richard i think
next
month would be his last meeting because
he did not run for re-election so
hopefully he'll come and he served on
the tree commission twice so four years
it'd be nice to honor him
in some way
and if there's no other business to come
before the true commission we are
adjourned
oh so
it can't
[Music]
a little bit
more on patio leaders we'll probably
have the doors open
yeah
good cheer so yeah
and i think i finally fixed this
and i think everyone knows the mayor has
a new executive assistant
does everybody know that
a new executive assistant
natalie foughter water okay
and um
she's undoubtedly working very hard to
get the mayor organized
yeah and uh yeah so he's so he's got
some help and i think you may see emails
from her so now you know where she fits
in the scheme of things
there's no other business to come before
the good of the order we will do good
things and adjourn and go home
thank you all for being here
and the oreos are available
so we'll get some of this um
would say
you