Let’s count the ways we lose if local ordinances disappear
Ever since it became evident that the Texas Legislature’s special session would include a targeted attack on tree protection, TreeFolks has been inundated with calls and emails from across Texas. Clearly, the public — including many legislators — have questions about the impact of proposed bills reversing tree ordinances.
In short, the proposals — House Bill 70, and Senate Bills 14 and 86 — prevent cities from setting any requirements regarding tree removal by any property owners, builders or developers. Should the proposed legislation be successful, the financial, physical and emotional health of our cities would be severely compromised.
The technical claims propping up the bills are untrue: that property owners can’t remove trees under current rules; protections for large trees represent a taking; and that these claims justify suspending local control when it comes to trees.
There is a difference be- tween a single tree and trees en masse, which we refer to as a forest. Even in dense cities, the roots that interlock underground and the branches that weave together above create a living, breathing, forested ecosystem that provides for us in ways we cannot possibly replicate after their removal.
There exists an entire school of research that calculates the infrastructure value of trees in cities. How many treatment plants would it take to clean the amount of water the urban forest cleans? In Austin, Water Treatment Plant 4 cost $523 million and can treat 50 million gallons per day. A mature tree can process 300 gallons per day. There are 33.8 million trees in Austin, and only 3.4 percent of those qualify as large-diameter — or larger than 15 inches. That still means there are 1.14 million trees pumping away at our highest rates. That means just our largest trees are cleaning the equivalent of seven water treatment plants. Imagine the financial cost and time to replace that.
The same is true of stormwater capture, where Austin’s trees have avoided 65 million gallons of runoff this year. Think of the costs associated with the Onion Creek flood buyout or retrofitting Shoal Creek — and multiply that by scads of money.
Consider the costs of air pollution. Trees place their leaves at the precise height at which we must breathe. Ozone removal is estimated at 1,120 tons per year.
Also, consider how trees help cool homes — 30 percent less electricity is needed under a tree canopy — or how they help with asthma and groundwater recharge. We haven’t even talked about psychological effects of living near trees, as new research is showing they reduce stress and increase well-being.
Just ask our friends in Bastrop and Hays counties, who had large-scale overnight removal of their forests. They will tell you that after homes were rebuilt, the absence of trees stays with them and makes it hard for their hearts to recover.
In the drier parts of Texas, trees are hard to come by. A tree that takes 40 years to reach maturity in wetter regions can take 100 or more in Central Texas. Our oldest heritage trees are frequently 1,000 years old. In the past three decades, forest cover in Austin has shrunken from almost 40 percent to 30 percent due to drought and development. Most of our forest cover is on private land — precisely the land affected by the pending legislation.
Nothing is without cost — and we will pay for this. Short-term gain for those who want to remove trees will result in higher costs for us all as we struggle to replace the services they provide. We will need higher taxes to handle floods, clean water, hold down ozone levels, run the AC and plant replacement trees for the future.
Trees provide a public service and represent a public resource — and they must be treated like such. We urge the Texas Legislature to allow cities to protect them — if not for ourselves, then for our children and grandchildren.