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Somerville committee seeks revisions to tree-preservation ordinance; pauses to get more legal and operational detail
Summary
Committee members requested a rewrite of proposed tree-preservation ordinance amendments after the law department and inspectional services raised legal and practical concerns about stop-work authority, permit suspension and enforcement definitions.
Committee members on April 15 discussed proposed amendments to Somerville’s tree-preservation ordinance and asked staff to return with a revised draft addressing enforcement mechanics, the scope of stop-work authority and clarifications about who may be treated as the regulated "offender." Staff and the law department advised changes to language to avoid legal ambiguity and to provide enforceable remedies.
Assistant City Solicitor Meredith Stivers told the committee the law department and Inspectional Services Department (ISD) had concerns about giving the tree warden broad stop-work authority that could overlap with building-code enforcement. "If you limit the jurisdiction of a stop work order to something... specific to pruning the tree, that seems a little more legally sustainable than if you say,…
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