Hooksett planning board approves amended SNHU athletic-complex landscaping, exempts 11-tree requirement

The Hooksett Planning Board voted to approve an amended site plan and as‑built landscaping for Southern New Hampshire University’s athletic complex after staff and the university described an audit of what was planted versus the plan the town had originally signed.

The board’s action, made after a public hearing, accepted the university’s updated planting plan and an independent audit of existing conditions but removed one specific condition — that 11 trees in an interior parking island be replanted. The applicant said those trees had “suffocated themselves” and were intentionally removed; the board accepted an exemption for those 11 trees and approved the plan with the remaining conditions described in the staff draft.

The town planner told the board the original signed plan differed from other planting sets the university had on file; the approval reconciles the town’s record with the current “as planted”…