Welcome everyone to the Board of Commissioners meeting for Monday, October 27, 2025, and to call the meeting to order.

I apologize for being late.

Would everyone join me at the Pledge of Allegiance?

Thank you.

I want to give notice that we did have an executive session on October 17th virtually.

And we had an executive session prior to this meeting, both to discuss real estate and legal matters.

We have several presentations tonight.

First, we're going to have the Shade Tree Committee telling us about some of their recommendations for maintenance of trees in the right of way.

Mr.

Foster, do you want to start us off or Mr.

Gibbons?

Okay.

Yeah, this is just an introduction.

We have uh Mr.

Gibbons, the chair of the uh Shade Tree Commission.

Um, but the presentation will be given by uh Frank Parris, one of the members of Shade Tree.

He has uh always handled our bare root tree program.

So he was an integral part in us developing um this uh recommendation that you're about to see.

Mr.

Paris.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Paris.

Uh thank you for letting me speak.

Um it's going to be short, I hope.

Um, but first I wanted to talk about something that happened uh a couple weeks ago, and that is Delaware County did an ass commissioned an assessment of the county's tree canopy for the period 2010 to 2022.

Their findings for the whole county.

Could you speak a little more into the mic either or give it a tap, make sure it's working?

Yep, it is.

Just so just sort of bring it over to you and speak louder.

They're having trouble hearing you in the back.

Okay, sorry about that.

But anyway, Delaware County uh commissioned an uh an assessment that was conducted by the University of Vermont about the tree cover in uh Delaware County.

Some of their findings were for specifically for Radner, which I think we can be very, very proud of, is that 50 percent, 2% of our township is covered by canopy.

And this is kind of significant because I personally did a uh tree canopy study five years ago and it was 52 percent.

So in the last five years, it appears, you know, margin of error, we pretty much maintained our canopy within within the township.

Um for as far as us compared to the other townships, um we had the second largest tree canopy with 4500 acres covered by trees within the township.

Um we're about 8,000 acres, obviously.

Uh but over that 12-year period, Radner had the second lowest change in canopy.

While we did lose 70 acres over the 12 years, um that was only one percent, you know, of what we have.

Um the loss, of course, we've had uh loss due to disease, age and development.

But I think the the proud thing for for me as a township resident is it's offset by our shade tree ordinance, because we review with all the developers.

Uh we've got tree planting programs, the shade tree um uh the bare root program has planted about 1200 trees over the last five years.

And um we've had a lot of other giveaways, not only with us, but also with the Radina Conservancy.

So all this is to say we got all this stuff, how are we going to maintain it?

There was a segue.

Um the current situation is the township uh maintains the trees in the parks and in the right of way.

Uh they maintain the trees in the right of way if they're hazardous, dead, fallen, or lost large branches.

And we've had a lot of that, you know, during during October and December, uh September.

Um deemed necessary by our arbors, the township will remove the tree, all the debris, and grind the stump.

What the township does not do, it doesn't treat unhealthy trees with chemicals or whatever, uh, remove vines from trees, which can kill them, or prune them for aesthetic reasons, or remove a healthy tree at a residence request.

So that's kind of like where we are.

And uh at the Shade Tree Commission, we we uh discussed this, uh, worked with uh public works, and we came up with this recommendation, which is essentially the township should continue to main the right of way right-of-way trees, and also the parks.

I should have mentioned that.

Um but we wanted to uh suggest the residents have some sort of skin in the game and have some sort of financial responsibility for their maintenance.

That can take many forms, but we are recommending that they do get that skin in the game.

Um we could do a char a reasonable flat fee for any sort of tree maintenance done under the direction of public works, and consistent with uh the flat fees we already charge for people that can't plant a tree and they give us money in lieu of planting a tree.

Um this is our ordinance, which you guys all know, but I think this recommendation is consistent with what we've been doing under the current uh shade tree ordinance.

Um the issues that we considered uh is the benefits, of course.

Uh they provide cooling, uh flood control, well-being for the community.