Town Garners Public Feedback on Tree Policies

June 6, 2025
• As the town looks to better regulate tree removal, community members shared ideas and grievances with Needham’s tree maintenance during a listening session.

The newly formed Tree Preservation Planning Committee’s primary objective is to preserve Needham’s tree canopy, a response to a local trend of home teardowns that have resulted in tree loss. A prior effort to create a tree bylaw to oversee tree removal was not successful.

Residents are “troubled by the scale of tree removal in recent years,” Select Board Chair Heidi Frail said Tuesday during the tree committee’s first listening session at Powers Hall. The meeting aimed to solicit public feedback to shape the town’s policies and practices around trees.

Attendees voiced the need for more education around the town’s current tree removal strategies and for the town to address clear-cutting, wherein developers raze an entire lot to remove its trees. More than 50 people participated in person and via Zoom, brainstorming in smaller groups before presenting their thoughts to the committee.

“We think there are lots of opinions and lots of perspectives,” Frail said, “and we hope to achieve some regulations that will safeguard Needham’s trees into the future, but also safeguard residents’ interests, be they financial, environmental or aesthetic.”

Some expressed concern that Needham is losing its charm and natural beauty with the loss of trees. Needham resident Marian Lemay, a master gardener, spoke about the importance of planting native trees while lamenting the loss of biodiversity over the last 50 years.

“We don’t see fireflies at night, O.K.?” Lemay said.

Needham arborists abide by a guiding principle: “Right species, right location.” That means they only plant trees where they know they’ll thrive — flowering trees, for example, can grow healthily beneath power lines, but large shade trees cannot. Trees showing signs of disease or death, such as those along Webster Street outside Needham High School, are taken down.

In response to Lemay, Superintendent of Parks and Forestry Ed Olsen said arborists plant both native and non-native in an effort to promote diversity.

Trees absorb water runoff, making neighborhoods more resilient to flooding, and reduce CO2, which contributes to global warming.

Since first meeting in March, the Tree Preservation Planning Committee has focused on tree bylaws in surrounding towns, as well as education on Needham’s past and current tree practices.

Aside from other proposed actions, resident Holly Clarke advocated for a strong town and zoning bylaw with “teeth.” Her breakout session considered withholding demolition permits until developers connect with a town tree warden.

“I just think it’s past time to have a bylaw… Landscaping should be a part of every project,” Clarke said.

Without a bylaw, Needham has limited control over how developers deal with trees, exemplified by developments along Riverside Street. There, resident Naomi Ribner said the once-lush tree canopy on one side of the street is no longer, after developers cut down a couple dozen trees that were not replaced.

Committee member Artie Crocker, who chairs the Planning Board, recalled that very project.

“I remember pushing back and saying there must be something we have some leeway on, something related to trees,” he said, “but there was only so much leeway we had, so we were able to do something but very little because we didn’t have the authority because we don’t have the bylaw.”

Because a bylaw will take time to develop, Frail said the committee is examining other solutions to the problem for the short term.

Other residents suggested that potential consequences tied to future town regulations only target malicious actors, not those intending just to expand their home’s footprint.

“I have these old trees that everybody is in agreement we should be preserving,” resident Rob Braman said, “but I’m also very, very fearful, and I challenge the committee to be nuanced in your work and think creatively and come up with elegant solutions for those of us doing the right thing, that we are not the ones punished.”

Additional considerations centered on an incentive program for those who plant trees on their property or invest in the planting of trees elsewhere in town.

Along with sharing public information on Needham arborists’ policies, resident Peter Atallah said the town could create a dashboard for its tree canopy.

Following the meeting, the committee planned to debrief. As part of its charge, the board committed to sending its feedback on “priority tree preservation strategies” by June 15.

“The town has been trying to put this together for a while, and it’s just a really hard issue with a lot of stakeholders,” Frail said of the listening session, “so we’re really glad to see this started.”