Seeds of discontent as shire adopts tree policy

Feb. 27, 2015, 4 a.m.

A RARE moment of heated debate in the Corangamite Shire chamber has ended with a controversial street tree policy being adopted.

A RARE moment of heated debate in the Corangamite Shire chamber has ended with a controversial street tree policy being adopted.

Councillors were asked to adopt the Urban Street Tree Asset Management Plan, which sets out a framework to address issues around species selection, tree removal, protection and maintenance in towns around the shire.

The elm tree avenue in Camperdowns Manifold Street and the towns botanic gardens and the arboretum are exempt from the policy.

There were 10 submissions to the policy, with most saying it was flawed, too cumbersome and difficult to understand and lacked expert advice by qualified arborists.

An initial eight-week consultation period late last year failed to attract any submissions. A second consultation period in February this year had greater success.

Cr Ruth Gstrein moved an alternative motion to defer the decision until a later date so the policy could be reviewed, saying the council needed to listen to the community.

I think this document needs to be fine tuned. I think we can get a much better outcome if we looked at it again, Cr Gstrein said.

We owe it to the community to get it right the first time, rather than keep going back and reviewing.

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Seeds of discontent as shire adopts tree policy