Mountlake Terrace council hears presentation of first urban forest management plan; adoption and funding to follow

Mountlake Terrace city staff and consultants on Tuesday presented the city's first Urban Forest Management Plan, a 5-to-10-year guidance document that inventories street trees, sets canopy goals and lays out strategies for planting, maintenance and community engagement. The plan was developed with Washington Department of Natural Resources grant funding and recommendations from the Recreation and Parks Advisory Commission and the Planning Commission.

The plan matters because it converts an inventory and community input into measurable actions to protect and expand tree canopy citywide and identifies staffing and funding needs required to implement those actions.

Environmental programs manager Patrick Hutchins and consultant Matt Irmson of Planet Geo summarized the plan's findings and recommendations. Irmson said the project included a citywide street-tree inventory and canopy assessment; the inventory found 6,830 publicly managed trees and a citywide canopy cover of 32 percent. He said about 73 percent of inventoried trees are in good or excellent condition, roughly 70 percent are smaller than 12 inches in diameter (DBH), and just 7 percent exceed 24 inches DBH, which limits the near-term contribution of large, mature trees.

The plan sets five interlocking goals'Engage, Maintain, Grow, Retain and Know'and recommends specific actions under each. Those include a tree…