By Cary Shuman
The City Council unanimously approved a tree ordinance offered by Councilor-at-Large Katy Rogers at its meeting Monday night.
Rogers said the ordinance will essentially give Everett Arborist Jacob St. Louis “the opportunity to regulate our tree canopy to make sure it doesn’t continue to decrease with future development.”
Rogers said she has been working on the ordinance with the Mayor Carlo DeMaria Administration and other departments since the summer of 2024.
“The reason that we need a tree ordinance is because we have an arborist, who we hired about a year, and right now he has certain limitations in what he is able to do with his position because there are no ordinances in place in the City of Everett,” explained Rogers, “It opens a lot of opportunities at a state level for grants.”
Rogers subsequently noted the Healey-Driscoll Administration awarded Everett a $150,000 grant Monday for the installation of 75 new trees in the City.
In interpretating the legal ramifications of the new ordinance for property owners, Ward 6 Councilor Peter Pientrantonio asked“ If a city tree’s roots were going on to my property, and I wanted to build a swimming pool, are we saying we can’t do it on my own private property?”
Responded Rogers, “If you were destroying a significant tree – a 100-year old tree, for example – and you were a developer, it would be up to the discretion of the arborist to determine those issues.”
Pietrantonio asked if a resident wanted to remodel his house, “would he be affected by this?”
“It’s aimed to go after people who have four units or more and avoid the mom-and-pop, landlord situation,” said Rogers.