I appreciate your sentiment concerning spending and your obvious support for Mr Imker. But, please prior to nominating him for The Nobel Prize In Economics would you please read the quote below and answer my question?

"A city staff member visits each proposed site, although the city has no power to forbid any trees from being cut down whether they are fully healthy or not, Rast has said. If a tree is healthy and is not threatening a home or other structure, staff will try and convince residents to save them, he added."

Since the city has no authority or say in whether a homeowner removes a tree, why the hell are they making the visit? We agree that spending must be curtailed and brought under control, but making manifestations without considerations of what the city's priorities are is simply wreckless.

They get paid to do something I guess. The city has the authority I thought to prevent home owners from cutting speciman trees. Very few trees are considered speciman in this town. All you need is an arborist to say something is wrong with it and the city will permit it. If Mr Rast is correct in saying the city has no power to forbid trees from being cut down then they are wasting our money paying code enforcement to go look. So instead of adding a fee to the permit process, just cancel the permits. Most HOAs have to give permission for trees anyway and they are usually more strict than the city.

Go here and search for 'ARTICLE XI. VEGETATION PROTECTION AND LANDSCAPE REQUIREMENTS'.

Some of this reads like good ole Harold wrote it with a felt-tip pen on the back of a wet bar napkin.

At the bottom you'll find "Sec. 1130. Procedures for removal of trees and other vegetation on residential property (following issuance of a certificate of occupancy)."

In paragraph (b) is states in part, "The city planner or his designee shall review the tree removal permit and inspect the property as necessary prior to removal of any trees."

What is doesn't say is what the necessity for the inspection is.

As mentioned earlier by Mike King, the city can't deny the homeowner a permit to remove any tree that the homeowner sees fit to remove, for any reason.

The part that gets me is that the city wants to make the homeowner get a separate tree removal permit for every five trees taken down. So if I have twenty trees I want taken down I need to get four separate permits and four separate inspections. How stupid is that?

So I wholeheartedly agree with Mike, get rid of the tree removal permit process altogether and don't waist a city employees time and my tax money by sending them to my property just so I can tell him/her to have a nice day while I'm firing up the chain saw.

What's up with this - Mr. Munford didn't live up to his usual standard and investigate and print the "official" response as to why a city employee is dispatched for tree removal?
I've never contacted the City about removal, and the leading tree removal services in PTC haven't mentioned it either. So I expect I've saved us all a few $'s. I will not call the city next time I need a tree removed, and I suggest the PTC Manager of Pre-Tree Removal Consultation be the next job to get the axe.

Again, Haddix has veered off of the golf cart path of wise judgment. Wow, it didn't take long.

Steve

Come to think of it, that should have been a question asked from council to staff.

Now I'll have to watch that web TV thing again to be sure but I don't remember anyone asking why the city sends someone out.

I guess the council just doesn't trust those of us that pay their salaries to do the right thing.

.

The ordinance is too weak and part of the effort is to make it stronger. When Council instituted it in the past they didn't give it enough bite. A big mistake.

Over 39,000 known trees have been removed the last 5 years and we know of people wanting to clear cut lots in wooded subdivisions that have no HOA's, in example.

Our biggest number of complaints has been against neighbors clear cutting lots, thus hurting adjoining homes value and aesthetics.

It impacts us all value wise, home and city. Look at areas like Shoppes, RAM and Delta building commercial properties, to avoid using residential as examples. Do you like the that open?

We are changing buffers, maintenance and other ordinances to clean up bad areas and get more green in areas that are too nude.

Those who have lived here a couple of decades know what I am talking about on the changes that have happened not for the better.

So, this is part of a bigger effort to improve our city.

OK, all, I am being on the blogs too much. I hope that info helps but please excuse me if I leave the discussion to you all now.

Don Haddix
Mayor Peachtree City

clear cutting is ridiculous..I've seen it, and it's UGLY

It's my property!

I paid for it!

I own it!

That I choose do with it as I please is none of your business!

Do you honestly think I paid $250,000+ for my home in PTC just so I could devalue my neighbors property?

"avoid using residential as examples."

How nice of you since your proposed fee would only effect RESIDENTIAL property owners!

"Our biggest number of complaints has been against neighbors clear cutting lots, thus hurting adjoining homes value and aesthetics."

Prove it. Show us the complaints.

In all honesty Mayor Haddix you're starting to sound allot like like EX-Councilman Boone when he said that he was getting only positive emails for the CCD development on 54 W.

It is your property as mine is mine. None of us can do absolutely anything we want on either.

I am not saying what you would do but I am sure saying what others have done or tried to do. My HOA has stopped several people from trying to clear cut in our wooded comunity, in example.

I have one email in response to this fee stating they want to clear cut over 60 trees from a wooded lot in a wooded community because they want grass, not trees.

As for commercial, we are rewriting buffer requirements to increase the number and size of canopy and under story trees to be preserved or planted upon development and adding replacement requirements.

So, no, we have not gotten only positive emails, there have been about 12 against. And no, it does not just apply to residential.

Just wanted to clear up that notion we are only looking at residential. And I will say the response in the workshop was positive on the goals we have with, of course, a few negatives as well.

I will close by saying it is impossible to make all happy. But the majority have expressed a need to preserve our city trees. That is why this is happening.

Now, with that clarification I am gone.

Don Haddix
Mayor Peachtree City

Mr Mayor:
Do what you have to do. People who complain that its their property and they should be allowed to do what they want, made a mistake buying in a planned community. The idea is to keep the community beautiful and have a set of code enforcement ordiances that protect all of our properties.
That's why I moved here...if I didn't agree, I would have moved 100 miles south and bought rural land that I could what I wanted to do with it!