A Lakewood hearing examiner recently ruled that a 900-year-old oak tree must be preserved after a developer wished to have it removed and replaced with a parking lot. The developer had also been assessed a nearly $240,000 penalty for removing roughly 70 trees from the site without a permit.
Meanwhile, in Edmonds, new regulations designated any tree with a trunk at least 30 inches across as a landmark tree, requiring city approval before its removal. Both stories raised a question KIRO hosts Gee Scott and Ursula Reutin couldn’t agree on: Do you actually own the trees on your property?
“My default is this: if you own the property, that’s your tree,” Gee said on “The Gee and Ursula Show” on KIRO Newsradio. “And now today, because we know what trees mean to the world and our oxygen, now we’re making city council come in and make amendments. Your property, your tree.”…