Perth Voice Interactive

A PROPOSAL to allow third parties to nominate trees on private land for a protection register has inched forward in Vincent, with the idea soon to go out for community consultation.

In recent decades many venerable trees have been felled on private property as owners either redevelop their land, subdivide the block, or pave their gardens. 

The exotic polyphagous shot-hole borer bug has also claimed many more trees in recent years, and Vincent mayor Alison Xamon says it’s been “devastating” to see so many felled in the borer’s wake.

The council’s current “Trees of Significance” register allows a property owner to volunteer one of their trees for extra protection (and some subsidies for maintenance). 

But it has not saved many trees: Only nine trees on private land have been added to the register in its 23-year existence. 

To stem the tide of tree loss, new changes proposed by mayor Alison Xamon will allow third-party nominations of trees, along with increased financial incentives to help owners’ fund the maintenance and get free arborist advice about their listed trees.

In November, former councillor Dudley Maier warned that a policy allowing third-party nominations could prompt landowners to clear trees now, before any rule is instituted, instead of face potential restrictions later (“Tree policy withdrawn after carnage warning”, Voice, November 23, 2024). He said incentives to keep trees was the way to go.

One councillor was wary of that outcome, Ashley Wallace, who voted against the new third-party nomination proposal.

“I’m very concerned that this change will have the opposite effect to what’s intended and may result in a net reduction of canopy coverage on private land as residents pre-emptively clear trees prior to a potential listing,” Cr Wallace said at the December 10 meeting.

Canopy area

He also said nominating individual trees would lead to inequity compared to an area-wide system where all trees meeting certain specifications (such as height, circumference, or canopy area) were automatically protected. Such an area-wide model has been proposed by the WA Local Government Association.

But council staff say Vincent’s Local Planning Scheme would need to be amended to allow such an area-wide policy, and that’d take up to 18 months and require approval from the minister for planning. It’d also mean removing the current significant tree protection clause to not conflict with the area-wide protection. 

For now councillors voted 8:1 to go ahead and publicly advertise for comments on the new third-party nominations and increased incentives for tree owners.

Ms Xamon said with the rate that trees being lost, they had to act fast.

“it’s been quite devastating for me to have only been in the mayoral position for a few months to suddenly be confronted with the extent of shothole borer, particularly within the City of Vincent and in some of our iconic parks,” Ms Xamon said.

“And that was in addition to the fact that with all the increased developments that are occurring in Vincent that there has been a huge loss of tree canopy on private land.”

Ms Xamon said she hoped that the community consultation might bring in more ideas from locals about how to best protect trees.

Many councils have been calling for state government action to protect trees, or for the state to at least allow them to implement their own tough policies at the council level.

Ms Xamon said at the December council meeting: “I am going to express once again my eternal frustration that the state government continues to deny local governments the opportunity to be able to implement planning measures which would enable us to look at tree canopy retention. 

“Similar strategies to that do exist in other states in Australia now, more ironic because of all the capital cities in Australia we have got the lowest level of tree canopy, and I think that’s absolutely shameful. 

“So the big piece of work that we have to do as a council is around advocacy at a state government level, to get them to enable us to be able to protect our own tree canopy.”

Vincent’s proposed changes are due to be advertised in the early new year.

by DAVID BELL