Salem developer gets second fine for tree removal
He says city officials did not respond to conservation plan
By BETH CASPER
Statesman Journal
For the second time this year, developer George Suniga has been fined for removing trees without city approval for a development in South Salem.
The $47,250 civil penalty is the largest since the city revised its tree ordinance in August 2005.
Suniga was fined Oct. 24 for removing 58 trees -- three of which were larger than 24 inches around -- without waiting for city approval.
Mark Hoyt, Suniga's attorney, said the city received a tree conservation plan for the development in early June and had not responded.
In line with city regulations, the plan preserved 25 percent of the trees on the development, called Whispering Winds Estates, Hoyt said.
"We weren't asking for permission to cut any tree we couldn't cut," Hoyt said. "We are not going to pay a $47,000 fine because the city didn't issue a permit in time."
But even trees that were supposed to be saved under the developer's own tree conservation plan were cut, said Suzanne Ocampo, the city's zoning enforcement officer.
Ocampo said 19 of the 58 trees cut down were set to be saved.
"The issue isn't that (the trees) would not have been allowed to be removed," Ocampo said. "The issue is that they were removed prior to a permit being issued."
In fact, only 56 percent of the trees on Suniga's property were removed. Under the city's tree ordinance, 75 percent can be removed.
City staffers issue approval of tree conservation plans at the same time as subdivision plan approval, so that trees aren't cut that should remain standing if the layout of a subdivision changes.
City staffers said that the tree conservation plan and subdivision plan was submitted June 8. The required subdivision hearing ran into early September.
On Sept. 13, a city inspector went to the site and discovered 79 missing trees.
Neither the tree plan nor the subdivision plan had been approved by the city at that time, said Florence Davis, a Salem senior planner.
Suniga was fined only for removal of 58 trees because the ordinance allows developers to clear 15 percent of a property's trees without a permit.
Most of the trees removed were small. Many of them were cherry trees with 12-inch to 14-inch diameters, Ocampo said. One was a 48-inch oak tree and two others were 24-inch oak trees.
Suniga's attorney Hoyt said the oaks were not rare Oregon white oaks. An arborist has determined the trees were red oaks, Hoyt said.
The city based the penalty on the assumption that the three oaks were Oregon white oaks, in part because the oak trees surrounding the area are Oregon white oak, Ocampo said.
"On the tree plan, it says 'oak,'" Ocampo said. "The trees around there are white oak. They say they were ornamental red oaks that somebody planted. But when I got out there (the trees were) literally a pile of bark about 8 feet high."
The penalty could be reduced by $4,000 if the trees are determined to be red oaks.
Suniga appealed the penalty on Nov. 3. A hearing must be scheduled within 30 days of an appeal.
In early July, Suniga was fined $10,000 for removing five trees that were supposed to be protected at his Waln Creek Estates subdivision, 5532 Liberty Road S.