City to Remove Thousands of Pest-Ridden Eucalyptus Trees

It may sound like a character out of Dr. Seuss, but the red gum lerp psyllid is costing the city of Los Angeles real money.

Facing huge liability risks, the city has embarked on a $2.3-million effort to remove from parks some of the roughly 20,000 eucalyptus trees believed to have been killed by the rampant pest.

“We lost the battle with the bug,” said Jim Combs, assistant general manager of the city parks department. “We have a liability that has increased a hundredfold because of this.”

The council approved the first $598,000 this month to remove 1,500 trees killed by the pinhead-sized insect that is native to Australia. An additional $1.7 million has been proposed for next year’s budget to remove 3,500 more trees from picnic areas, golf courses, sports fields and other heavily used areas.

Much of the work is driven by concerns about safety--limbs could fall from trees killed by the lerp psyllid. Officials still are smarting from a case last year in which the city paid $7.6 million to a man left paralyzed when he was struck by a falling palm tree.

“This is a significant problem,” said Los Angeles City Councilman Jack Weiss, who heads the council committee overseeing the parks agency.

Infestations have been found throughout the state after the pest was discovered in Los Angeles in 1999 by the Zoo Department, which found it in trees grown to provide leaves for feeding its koalas.

Many of the trees are 75 years old or more.

Environmentalists understand the need to prevent injury, but several expressed disappointment that the financially strapped city has not provided funding to reforest the affected parks.

“We don’t want to see trees on the ground with no resources to replant,” said Andy Lipkis, head of Tree People. “We are gearing up to raise money for that at a time when raising money is difficult.”

Combs said the city intends to plant 10,000 new trees in the next five years, and his department will seek grants for the work. There is no funding in next year’s budget proposal for replanting.

It costs from $50 to $250 to plant and maintain a tree, Lipkis said. But the city had trouble finding just the first $598,000 to begin the removals because the post-Sept. 11 economic slump has created a potential budget deficit.

The city might have saved money and trees by acting sooner to battle the pest, Lipkis said.

“They waited quite a long time to try to save them, and so the trees are dying,” he said.

The city first tried releasing 1.5 million ladybugs in the hope that they would kill the lerp psyllids, which feed on the fluids of the trees, making them susceptible to other insects. But that initial effort was not effective, said Teresa Proscewicz, principal forester for the parks agency.

The city is having more success with releases of Australian wasps, but it is too late for about 20,000 trees. About 15,000 of those are in remote hilly areas, including many in Griffith Park, and there are no plans to remove them because they are not easily accessible.

Of the 5,000 targeted for removal, 1,500 are in Griffith Park. Infected groves are also targeted in North Hollywood Park, Proscewicz said.

Although $2.3 million has been allocated or proposed to date, it may cost the city up to $5 million to remove all of the dangerous trees and plant new species, according to a report to the City Council.

City officials have been torn over the expensive tree-removal program, questioning whether it is the best use of scarce financial resources.

With liability headaches ranging from police shootings to cracked sidewalks, the City Council debated sharply about whether to devote so much money to removing trees.

City officials said any replanting will likely involve other kinds of trees.

“We will replant with something that is more structurally sound,” Proscewicz said.