1 From: Ronit Bryant
Sent: Friday, June 6, 2025 9:29 AM
To: City Council
Subject: Item 6.3 Modifications to the City of Mountain View Master Fee Schedule CAUTION: EXTERNAL EMAIL - Ensure you trust this email before clicking on any links or attachments.
Dear City Council members,
You are being asked to approve raising the fee for Heritage Tree removal appeals from $50 to $318. Please do not move forward with this increase at this time. Here are two good reasons for not moving forward:
1. The Heritage Tree Ordinance will be reviewed through the Biodiversity and Urban Forestry Plan that the City is currently working on. Changes to the fee structure should be part of the thinking involved in the Plan. Let the public debate and discuss this issue and the implications of fee changes.
I will add that the cost to the City of a Heritage Tree appeal ($6,351 compared to only $1,125 for processing an application, per the May 8 report to the CFC) is surprising - we should look first at why an appeal costs the City so much money. Could it be related to the fact that each PRC Heritage Tree Board meeting now includes two City lawyers? Could the process be made more efficient?
2. In my experience as PRC Commissioner (now in the second year of my third term), Heritage Tree appeals frequently serve as a tool for concerned neighbors to try to protect their immediate area from deforestation. In many cases, property owners want to get rid of heritage trees to save themselves from maintenance costs and inconveniences that could actually be resolved with some creative solutions. Since Council supports resilience, livability, community decision making, and active transportation, please do not make Heritage Tree appeals unaffordable to the community.
Sincerely,
Ronit Bryant
1 From: Laura Robichek
Sent: Monday, June 9, 2025 6:04 AM
To: City Council
Cc: [email protected]
Subject: Fees for Appealing appeal a Heritage Tree decision CAUTION: EXTERNAL EMAIL - Ensure you trust this email before clicking on any links or attachments.
Dear City Council member,
I strongly oppose the new proposal to raise the fee to appeal the destruction of beautiful Heritage Trees. (RE:
Council Agenda Item 6.3: Modifications to the City of Mountain View Master Fee Schedule; the proposed fees are on page 24 of the resolution)
I actually don’t think there should be a fee at all simply to request leaving a tree as is. A lot of us love our heritage trees and consider it a crime to cut them down because they do so much for our quality of life and clean air.
Don’t you also love our trees?
Please reconsider this terrible proposal.
Thank you,
Laura Robichek
1 From: Ronit Bryant
Sent: Sunday, June 8, 2025 10:08 AM
To: City Council
Subject: Re: Item 6.3 Modifications to the City of Mountain View Master Fee Schedule CAUTION: EXTERNAL EMAIL - Ensure you trust this email before clicking on any links or attachments.
Dear City Council members,
I recently sent you an email asking you to not move forward with raising the fee for Heritage Tree appeals. I took the information about the size of the increase from the CFC report. However, the CFC apparently directed staff to implement larger increases in this fee. Looking at what is now being proposed to Council, I see that the increase in fees is quite extraordinarily larger: going from $50 to $650 effective July 2025, and then to $1,250 effective July 2026 (as set out in the Resolution before you). Frankly, that is a shocking increase, liable to be interpreted as a way to end Heritage Tree Removal appeals.
Here is the text of my previous email sent June 6:
Dear City Council members,
You are being asked to approve raising the fee for Heritage Tree removal appeals from $50 to $318. Please do not move forward with this increase at this time. Here are two good reasons for not moving forward:
1. The Heritage Tree Ordinance will be reviewed through the Biodiversity and Urban Forestry Plan that the City is currently working on. Changes to the fee structure should be part of the thinking involved in the Plan. Let the public debate and discuss this issue and the implications of fee changes.
I will add that the cost to the City of a Heritage Tree appeal ($6,351 compared to only $1,125 for processing an application, per the May 8 report to the CFC) is surprising - we should look first at why an appeal costs the City so much money. Could it be related to the fact that each PRC Heritage Tree Board meeting now includes two City lawyers? Could the process be made more efficient?
2. In my experience as PRC Commissioner (now in the second year of my third term), Heritage Tree appeals frequently serve as a tool for concerned neighbors to try to protect their immediate area from deforestation. In many cases, property owners want to get rid of heritage trees to save themselves from maintenance costs and inconveniences that could actually be resolved with some creative solutions. Since Council supports resilience, livability, community decision making, and active transportation, please do not make Heritage Tree appeals unaffordable to the community.
Sincerely,
Ronit Bryant
On Fri, Jun 6, 2025 at 9:29 AM Ronit Bryant wrote:
Dear City Council members,
You are being asked to approve raising the fee for Heritage Tree removal appeals from $50 to $318. Please do not move forward with this increase at this time. Here are two good reasons for not moving forward:
2 1. The Heritage Tree Ordinance will be reviewed through the Biodiversity and Urban Forestry Plan that the City is currently working on. Changes to the fee structure should be part of the thinking involved in the Plan. Let the public debate and discuss this issue and the implications of fee changes.
I will add that the cost to the City of a Heritage Tree appeal ($6,351 compared to only $1,125 for processing an application, per the May 8 report to the CFC) is surprising - we should look first at why an appeal costs the City so much money. Could it be related to the fact that each PRC Heritage Tree Board meeting now includes two City lawyers? Could the process be made more efficient?
2. In my experience as PRC Commissioner (now in the second year of my third term), Heritage Tree appeals frequently serve as a tool for concerned neighbors to try to protect their immediate area from deforestation. In many cases, property owners want to get rid of heritage trees to save themselves from maintenance costs and inconveniences that could actually be resolved with some creative solutions. Since Council supports resilience, livability, community decision making, and active transportation, please do not make Heritage Tree appeals unaffordable to the community.
Sincerely,
Ronit Bryant