Canton Township planners weigh new acreage thresholds, propose allowing up to four tree removals without permit

Patrick, a planning department staff member, reviewed the final sections of Canton Township’s draft Tree and Woodland Preservation Ordinance and outlined options for allowing property owners to remove a limited number of trees annually without a formal permit.

Why it matters: the township’s current ordinance exempts all occupied parcels under two acres from permit requirements, a design that was raised during a legal challenge because parcels two acres or less make up about 96 percent of lots in Canton but only about 38 percent of the township’s acreage. Staff said that changeable acreage thresholds and a numerical cap on annual removals are being considered to make enforcement and legal defense more practicable.

Patrick said the packet on the commissioners’ desks contained an older July draft and that a revised draft incorporating recent changes will be presented at the March 17 meeting. He walked commissioners through maps showing parcel distributions at thresholds of two acres, one acre, a half acre and a quarter acre. He said about two-thirds (approximately 66 percent) of Canton parcels are a quarter acre or less but those represent only about 15 percent of the township’s land area.

To address the legal concern…