Who Speaks for the Trees?

Image source: The Atlantic

From The Atlantic:

It’s almost like the government’s imposing its will on its residents,” Trayon White, the D.C. councilmember for Ward 8, said at the council’s June 6 legislative meeting. He wasn’t talking about a proposed highway, a subway station, a power plant, or—perish the thought—an apartment building. He was talking about trees: specifically, three linden trees on Xenia Street planted a few years ago by D.C.’s Urban Forestry Division. To my surprise, the legislative body of a major American city experiencing escalating homelessness and a serious spike in violent crime dedicated a quarter of its time that day to discussing three trees.

White said he was concerned about the potential risk to property values and what he sees as a “reasonable fear” that once mature, the trees would “be large enough to make it difficult to see through and around the walkway, which is a public-safety concern.” He asked his colleagues to support an emergency resolution to remove them before this happened.

For a while, the members carried on as though this were a perfectly normal matter for their attention. A few suggested that perhaps expanding the tree canopy was good, actually. But no one really questioned the underlying premise of White’s proposal: that the community had risen up in dendrophobic opposition.

“We want to note that these are homeowners who are worried about the value of their homes,” White said. “I just believe that [the District Department of Transportation, or DDOT] can be more friendly in responding to the needs of the community with their request, and if they’re requesting different trees, I don’t see what the big problem is.”