Lake Oswego council approves urban forest plan

The Lake Oswego City Council passed a revamped plan last week that will guide the city’s efforts to preserve its urban forest.

The council unanimously voted during a meeting Tuesday, June 17 to approve the first update of the city’s Urban and Community Forestry Plan since the initial adoption of the plan in 2008.

The plan includes myriad policy objectives including (but not limited to): increasing the tree planting budget, completing an inventory of trees in the city right of way, increasing transparency regarding the tree removal permit process, updating the city’s tree code so that standards are considered to be clear and objective and therefore meet state law, conducting a hazardous tree survey, developing a strategy to increase tree management funds, bolstering the tree canopy in areas that are lacking, requiring more mitigation trees to be planted for certain removal permits, conducting tree maintenance workshops and more.

The tree code and the city’s general focus on preserving the urban forest have been key issues in Lake Oswego for years. Concern about these topics was reinforced when the January ice storm caused hundreds of trees in the community to fall, including on private property. The city has said it would review its tree code following the completion of this planning process.

The plan includes a general idea of how expensive each project will be as well as whether or not the city will need to find additional funding sources for each item. At the meeting, Community Development Director Jessica Numanoglu said the city has about $300,000 in its tree fund that could go toward certain efforts, but there is still a need to determine exactly what that money can be used for.

“We will get that straightened out and, once we figure out what we are allowed to use those funds for, we can set those priorities,” she said. “We definitely have a good amount of funds to use and there are lots of actions in here that could benefit from that.”

The city conducted focus groups and surveys during the planning process and it also included a review of existing policies and tools for measuring progress within the local urban forest.

“It seems that a good urban and community forest plan requires responsive policy, accurate and thorough data to support the strategy, and strong and active participation by the community as well,” Mayor Joe Buck said at the meeting. “I think this plan brings all of those elements to the table. But like we just talked about, it’s only going to be brought to life by prioritization of both city resources to accomplish the work and a commitment on the part of the community. Hopefully this plan lays a good groundwork for all of that to happen.”