Ancient, giant oak cut down
Advocate staff photo by Richard Alan Hannon
Steve Shurtz, director of the city-parish's Office of Landscape and Forestry, visited the site Tuesday where tree cutters felled a 300-year-old live oak tree on North Harrell's Ferry Road near South Sherwood Forest Boulevard. He tried to stall the workers, but found the move was legal.
By CHANTE DIONNE WARREN
cwarren@theadvocate.com
Advocate staff writer
The sprawling centuries-old oak tree that shaded and defined a portion of North Harrell's Ferry Road is no more.
The giant oak, which sat a couple of lots behind McDonald's restaurant and across from a Rite Aid pharmacy, was listed last year in the East Baton Rouge Parish Registry of Ancient, Historic and Unique Trees. On Tuesday morning, workers with chain saws downed the tree and city-parish officials couldn't do anything about it.
The property owner, Sied B. Redwan, wanted the tree removed from his lot in the 11000 block of North Harrell's Ferry Road, Steve Shurtz, director of the city-parish's Office of Landscape and Forestry, said.
Redwan could not be reached for comment Tuesday.
"We have no legal remedy here," Shurtz said.
"To some, it's a valuable heritage and to others, it's a nuisance. I guess to this owner, it's a nuisance. You see how quickly 300 years can disappear."
Nearby business owners watched in disbelief as limbs and branches from the tree, which spanned about 30-feet in circumference, fell.
"It's just a shame," said Carl Kennedy, who owns an accounting service and "Get Gifts" shop near the tree. Kennedy covered his own shop sign with a printed message asking to "help" save the oak.
An employee at another business behind the tree also watched in disappointment.
"It's pretty horrible what's going on. Something that old shouldn't be torn down," said Ryan Scott, of Power and Control System's Inc.
But it can.
The city-parish doesn't have ordinances to protect these types of trees from being demolished, Shurtz said. "It's one of those things where there are communities that have ordinances that restrict this and others that don't," he said. "Baton Rouge is one."
The tree ordinance that is in effect is part of the Unified Development Code, the technical rules devised to govern development.
In June, the Tree and Landscape Commission, an advisory agency to the mayor, sought public support for proposed changes that would require more greenery and better enforcement of the existing ordinance when new developments are built.
The ordinance calls for one tree in every 10,000 square feet, about the same amount of space as the average-sized property for a single family home.
The proposed changes would require four trees in the same space, greenery to shield parking lots from the street and vegetation between buildings and parking lots. The ordinance does not require any shrubs or ground cover for new developments.
But the ordinance needs more teeth, Shurtz said, and negotiations are ongoing. Shurtz has said that in addition to their beauty, another benefit of having trees is their impact on the environment.
The Tree and Landscape Commission recently made tree preservation recommendations to the Zoning Advisory Commission to help prevent ancient trees from encountering the same fate as the North Harrell's Ferry Road tree, Shurtz said. One recommendation would require property owners to have permits before removing something like a historic tree or even offering tax breaks to owners who want to build.
If the two commissions complete negotiations soon, Shurtz said, the recommendations could reach the parish's Planning Commission by March. Beyond that, he said, public hearings will be held and the Metro Council, which started the tree registry in 1996, will take up the matter.
"There will be lots of opportunity for regular folks to make their opinions heard," Shurtz said.
Councilman Darrell Ourso, who along with Councilman Mike Walker helped put the oak tree on the parish's registry of ancient trees, said its demise will serve as an example.
"The best we can hope for is a wake-up call. We demanded better billboard legislation and we need to do the same for trees," he said.
Earlier this month, the Metro Council approved a measure that extends a buffer in all directions from a sign. Under the new restrictions, the size of the buffer varies according to the size of the sign.
Signs with a face of 275 square feet or less would have a 110-foot buffer, those with a face of 276 to 378 square feet would have a 165-foot buffer and those bigger than 379 square feet would require a 250-foot buffer.
Those distances more than double the minimum buffer between an off-premise billboard and any property zoned residential or rural. The minimum buffer has been 50 feet.
As for the trees, Ourso shared Shurtz' view on offering tax credit incentives to give property owners a chance to think twice before deciding to down them. "I'm going to do whatever I can to encourage council members to do so. This is a 300-year-old tree destroyed " in one day, he said.
"We don't have to make a requirement a negative thing. There are incentives we can incorporate so it won't become as a negative," he said.
Ourso was carrying his child to day care at 8:30 a.m. Tuesday when he said he noticed trucks and tree-cutting equipment around the tree.
Ourso called Shurtz, who reached the site as the tree-cutting began and tried to stall the job. Workers from Borskey Tree Service showed Shurtz their liability insurance and license to cut the tree.
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