Residents Persuade City to Save 3 Trees

A week after one Orange County neighborhood persuaded officials to chop down 25 blossoming jacaranda trees, another has beat city hall to save a trio of towering magnolias.

Last week the Yorba Linda City Council agreed to remove the jacarandas after residents complained their falling blossoms are messy. On Monday, a Fullerton commission bowed to the will of nearly 50 residents with the opposite point of view.

The Fullerton residents opposed a city plan to remove three magnolias that officials say are damaging sidewalks. The trees, on West Malvern Avenue off Harbor Boulevard, are 25 to 45 years old and stand at least 40 feet high.

The trees were to be replaced with St. Mary magnolias, which have less invasive roots and grow to be about 25 feet tall.

Resident Mike Strauss appealed the city’s plan to the Community Service Commission.

“The trees are a tremendous value to the neighborhood and to Fullerton,” Strauss said in a video presentation to the board. “This area really has a sense of history.”

Residents expressed concern that home values would decrease without the stately trees. Bruce Hostetter asked how residents would be compensated for the loss.

City officials acknowledged the topic is a sensitive one.

“Trees are a very emotional issue because it’s a living organism,” said Dan Sereno, the city’s landscape superintendent and the person who ordered the trees cut down. “No one wants to see them taken away or killed. I don’t like to see things go away.”

While commissioners voted unanimously to spare the trees, they also expressed sympathy for the city’s view that the magnolias could be creating a hazard and a legal liability.

“This was a close call for me,” Commissioner Craig Russell said. “I’m one with small kids who have the training wheels and roller-blades. . . . I can live with losing a couple of trees if that makes the sidewalks safer.”

Chairwoman Kathleen Dalton said the subject will definitely come up again.

“We’re faced with a lot of issues, and it’s a double-edged sword,” Dalton said. “We’re blessed with an amazing forest, but we have an incredible mission to balance it.”