When city hall owns the tree in your yard, watch for trouble

Wait, what?

That magic moving line between private property and public property just got a whole lot more wobbly.

Think of the sidewalks outside many homes. They’re owned by the city, not the homeowner.

Yet if that homeowner does not keep the city’s sidewalk clear of snow and ice, there will be a hefty fine from city hall.

If you don’t stay on top of the situation with salt, elbow grease, and a variety of tools, the city’s workers will clear the snow “for you” and bill you for their time and trouble.

What astounding chutzpah on the part of the city, to arrange this sweet deal for itself: “We own it, you take care of it.”

Some people have pointed out that the organization that owns the property should take care of it, but this very reasonable argument has so far fallen on deaf ears.

Now, the whole conundrum has moved to another level of wackiness after a Waterloo man was told he can’t make maple syrup.

Scott Weldon lives in Uptown Waterloo. He’s a teacher with the Waterloo Region District School Board. In the course of his duties, he has tapped a maple tree on school property and taught kindergarten students how to collect the sap and boil it down to make syrup.

Then he thought his own kids might enjoy that same activity at home.

There’s a big maple tree in the front yard next door to Weldon’s house, and his neighbour gave permission. So each year for four years, the family collected about 30 litres of sap, which makes one litre of syrup. (That’s a lot of boiling; no wonder the finished product is so expensive.)

But then, to everyone’s surprise, the neighbouring home got a cease-and-desist order from the city.

“Any cut or injury to a tree is considered an open wound and makes the tree susceptible to a number of pathogens and disease,” the City of Waterloo director of environment and park services, Jeff Silcox-Childs, said

in an email.

“The act of tapping or drilling into a tree can impact decades of growth,” he wrote.

“If done properly, it may have only minor impact to a healthy, vigorously growing tree, but it could cause damage to a tree already under stress.”

Anyone who does damage to such a tree will have to pay, according to the Protection of Trees on City Property bylaw.

City property? But the tree is in the neighbour’s front yard.

Yes, but apparently part of your front yard is still city property. Something many of us don’t know, including Weldon and his neighbour, is that the municipality often owns a strip of your yard about a metre in from the sidewalk.

Can you hear the refrain? “We own it, you make room for it.”

It’s a shame that the city is being so adamant about an utterly benign activity.

“It’s always easier to shut down instead of build up and educate,” said Weldon, who thinks the city could at least issue permits to people who want to make syrup responsibly.

That’s an excellent point. So is his argument that nothing but good can come from teaching children how they get their food, and how time-consuming that can sometimes be.

After all, this area is the home of the famous Elmira Maple Syrup Festival, which supports “urban sugaring” projects like this one.

Ask yourself this: What activity, other than a) various sports that involve ice-skating, and b) feeling superior to Americans, is more quintessentially Canadian than making sweet, delicious maple syrup with your own hands?

Unless it’s fighting city hall, and losing.