Tacoma committee advances urban forestry package after broad public comment and legal questions

The Infrastructure, Planning & Sustainability Committee on March 11 voted to advance a council consideration request to expand Tacoma—s urban forestry program and further implement the city—s 2019 Urban Forest Management Plan, sending the item for a March 25 study session at the full City Council.

Public commentators pressed the committee to move quickly to protect large trees and increase planting rates while staff and the city attorney warned that any new regulations affecting private property will require careful legal analysis and planning commission review.

The action matters because Tacoma has a stated goal of reaching a 30% tree canopy by 2030, public speakers said, while current canopy cover stands near 20% and the city is planting fewer than 2,000 trees a year toward an identified target of roughly 10,000 trees annually. Committee discussion focused on five categories of possible action in the memo before members: citywide tree preservation rules for development sites, a permit structure for removing trees on nondevelopment sites, canopy requirements or incentives for parking lots, canopy rules or incentives in commercial/manufacturing zones and very low equity areas, and expanded city services and funding options for trees in the public right of way.

Public comment and staff briefing Georgette Reuter, introduced as a longtime District 2 resident and member of the Tacoma Urban Forest Friends, urged the committee to follow the city—s own planning documents and act quickly to meet the canopy goal. "We believe that it is urgent for everyone to make a greater effort to protect and expand our vital urban forest," Reuter said.

Judy Valerian, who identified herself as working with the same urban forest group, said the 2019 Urban Forest Management Plan contains the data needed and asked the city to quantify the funding required to reach the planting target. "Unless we quantify that, unless we know that number, we can't...find a way to get the money," Valerian said.

Courtney Davis, also from the urban forestry citizen group, urged the committee to protect trees 18 inches and above, citing a planning commission recommendation, and to account for the loss of mature trees when calculating planting needs. Planning Commissioner Rob Crabill supported the memo's scope and suggested a joint task force between planning and sustainability commissions to help manage workload.

Legal and implementation constraints Steve Victor, the city's chief deputy city attorney, told the committee that regulations that limit land use on private property are subject to state law requiring planning commission review and must meet legal tests commonly described as nexus and proportionality (i.e., a connection between the regulation and the public benefit and a reasonable fit between the restriction and the benefit). Victor cited Seattle's recent approach of dividing the city into tree zones as one defensible model and warned that prior court rulings in other jurisdictions have struck down tree regulations when the supporting analysis was insufficient. "When we're defending it, ultimately, what the court looks at is what basis do we have to put this regulation? What work did we do?" Victor said.

Committee members and staff noted other implementation challenges: whether to adopt the "Home in Tacoma" tree requirements citywide or to tailor standards by zone and land use; how to treat hazardous or nuisance trees and emergency removals; and how to pay for planting and ongoing maintenance. Urban forestry staff told the committee the city's right-of-way code already defines hazardous, nuisance and invasive trees and that language could be copied into any new provisions for consistency.

Incentives, right-of-way funding and wood-waste diversion The memo presented nonregulatory tools including tax incentives, pilot programs, and permitting changes. Staff estimated upfront administrative costs for an incentive program could be on the order of tens of thousands of dollars; a staff member said a program to stand up incentives could cost about $50,000 in staff time. Members discussed options to fund expanded city management of street trees, including wastewater excise tax or a stormwater utility rate enhancement, and the feasibility of business-district maintenance agreements. Committee members and commenters also urged that wood-waste diversion and reuse be pursued in parallel; staff noted the council previously passed a resolution to dedicate funds to a wood-waste diversion study and that related work could be separated from the code-focused items.

Planning commission and timing Because many proposed changes would regulate the use of land, staff and the city attorney said the planning commission must review them; the commission already has a full work plan, so the committee discussed priorities and sequencing. Committee members asked staff to provide a fiscal-impact note for each item (staff time, legal analysis and, for incentives, direct budget impacts) and to identify which items would not require planning commission review (for example, some right-of-way service or funding actions).

Committee decision and next steps The committee voted to advance the package to the full City Council for a March 25 study session; the motion was made, seconded and adopted. The vote was recorded as adopted without a roll-call tally in the transcript.

Staff indicated they will return to the committee with an edited memo that: summarizes the five potential actions with fiscal notes; incorporates public comments received in writing; includes clarifications on right-of-way exemptions and on the planning commission—s likely role; and adds a study item on brownfield considerations for tree planting in industrial areas. The committee also asked staff to note how the urban forestry work should be prioritized relative to the planning commission—s existing workload and potential 2026 scheduling needs.

The committee—s action moves the urban forestry package to the full council—s agenda as an item for study; any regulatory proposals would later return to the planning commission for review and to the council for final adoption.

Ending Staff said written public comments received in advance will be responded to and that committee members can provide additional guidance to staff before the packet is finalized for the council study session on March 25.