Assessing Municipal Forestry Activity: A Survey of Home-Rule Municipalities in Texas, U.S.

Staff

The average number of staff per city was calculated with mega cities standing out at an average of 28.8 staff per city (Table 2). This large amount of staff illustrates the size of municipal forestry programs in cities with over 500,000 residents, relative to smaller cities in Texas. However, the average number of residents per staff member was similar between mega cities (60,764:1), large cities (67,427:1), and medium cities (46,181:1), with a weighted mean of about 55,000 residents per staff member. Small cities had an average 8,608 residents per staff member, although 39% of small cities responding to this question (n = 28) reported 0 staff.

No standard is known to exist that prescribes an appropriate ratio of city residents per staff member. Additionally, many cities may prefer to rely on fewer in-house staff who manage contractors to perform urban forestry work. This survey question wasn’t designed to capture contracted employees. But the existence of a professional staff member is the first program element represented in the SOAPs (USDA 2012). The point is that the individual responsible for the urban forest is a professional with the necessary qualifications (USDA 2012; O’Herrin 2013). So it’s a concern that about 27% of communities responding to this question (n = 62) reported 0 staff, indicating they don’t have even one employee on staff who dedicated at least 25% of their time to urban forestry—these were all small- or medium-sized cities.

This survey question wasn’t concerned with the qualifications of the staff responsible for managing the urban forest. Rather, researchers were trying to determine if any employee spends even 25% of their time on trees. The survey found 16 (36%) small and medium cities responding to this question (n = 47) had 0 FTE employees in charge of urban forestry. Of those 16 cities, only two (8%) had a tree board, and only four (16%) had a non-profit tree advocacy group. Unless many small and medium Texas cities rely exclusively on contractors to manage their urban forest, there is clearly a gap in small and medium Texas cities that needs to be filled with some type of urban forestry leadership.

Ordinances

This survey of Texas cities (Table 3) found that 58% of communities had the basic ordinance that “provides guidance on planting, maintaining, and removing trees on public property…” This compares with 62% of Oregon communities (Ries et al. 2007) that reported they had a municipal tree ordinance or other codes related to trees, and 80% of California communities (Thompson 2006) that reported they had a “tree ordinance.”

Treiman et al. (2011) found that 26% of city department heads (n = 521) and 50% of urban foresters (n = 28) in Missouri, U.S. responded that their community had “policies for tree preservation during development and/or construction.” The results from Texas showed that 48% of communities required tree protection on private property during construction activity. Treiman et al. (2011) reported that tree preservation became more common as city size increases, while the current study found that all types of tree ordinances generally became more common as city size increases, with only a slight decline among mega cities (Table 3).

Ordinances that extend to private property may often become controversial before, during, and after they are written into local law. This includes ordinances regulating the removal of trees on private property (43%) or require trees to be protected during construction on private property (48%). The basic tree ordinance is referred to here as “basic” because it doesn’t regulate trees on private property, and thus passing it would probably not be controversial. Yet only 58% of cities had passed the basic tree ordinance—hardly more than had passed the more controversial ordinances. Table 3 shows that all the ordinance types generally became more common as city size increased. Smaller communities may not see the need to protect or guide the management of their smaller public tree populations. Additionally, advocacy groups also became more common as city size increased. These advocates may have been playing a large role in the passage of tree ordinances.

Advocacy

Overall, 41% of cities responding to the survey had a tree board, and 40% had a non-profit group that regularly facilitated or donated tree planting or tree care on public property. Non-profit groups became much more common as city size increased, with 58% of large cities and 100% of mega cities having at least one non-profit advocacy group. A very similar trend was seen with tree boards as well.

Studies focusing on other states found similar results, including a survey of municipal forestry programs and tree wardens in Massachusetts, U.S., where Rines (2007) found that 41% of respondents had attained a group that advises/advocates for the “planting, protection, and/or maintenance of … community trees.” Kuhns et al. (2005) conducted a survey of Utah, U.S., communities and found 23% of respondents had a “tree board or similar committee.” In California, Thompson (2006) found that 58% of communities had a tree board/commission with “duties or some duties,” and that 23% of communities had a tree advocacy group. Ries et al. (2007) found that 38% of cities had a “tree advisory committee.”

Overall, the number of Texas cities with these two types of advocacy groups is similar to results found representing other states. However, considering the minimal expenses associated with establishing these potentially influential groups, they should be given more attention from advocates and urban foresters. Tree boards are comprised of volunteers and can cost very little to implement except volunteers’ time. Non-profit groups may be more complicated to operate by comparison, since a tree board relies on the municipal government for administration and organization, whereas a non-profit group generally does not expect this type of assistance. However, both types of groups are probably under-utilized based on the results of this survey.

Urban Forest Management Plans

Ries et al. (2007) found that only 9% of Oregon communities had a “community forest management plan.” In a large study of Missouri communities, Treiman et al. (2011) found that 17% of mayors and city councilors (n = 824) and 17% of city department heads (n = 521) responded that they had a management plan, while only 4% of urban foresters responded that their city had a management plan (n = 28). In Texas, researchers found that urban forestry management plans are very uncommon overall at 13% and were most common among large cities (33%). None of the four responding cities over 500,000 (mega cities) had a management plan at the time this survey was distributed (i.e., Austin, Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio), although Austin has since successfully passed one through its City Council thereby finally fulfilling a 22-year-old ordinance mandate. This exemplifies the difficulty often faced when establishing comprehensive/master urban forest plans.

Plans are difficult to implement because the management objectives they contain “should be defined based on an understanding of public attitudes, perceptions, and knowledge, a review of the agents of change, and the expressed needs and concerns of the community (client)” (Miller et al. 2015). This means a thorough planning process is costly in terms of money and/or employee time, and may explain why, in Table 4, there appears to be a connection between high spending rates and the presence of management plans.

Inventories and Proactive Tree Maintenance

Like management plans, inventories of street trees (20%) or park trees (22%) were also uncommon, whether they are comprehensive or sample inventories. However, the same connection between high expenditure rates and management plans can’t be made with inventories (Table 4).

In California, Thompson and Ahern (2000) found that about 55% of communities had their trees on a regular/systematic tree maintenance cycle, and “less than half of the respondents had a tree inventory of some kind.” The results from Texas show a similar trend, where more communities had their trees on proactive maintenance cycles (street trees 47%; park trees 60%) than had tree inventories (street trees 20%; park trees 22%). In both cases, this means that cities may be flying blind with only rough estimates based on the last maintenance cycle’s results to forecast future tree maintenance budget needs.

Like urban forest management plans, performing a tree inventory for the first time or keeping an existing inventory updated can be difficult due to the associated cost, whether paid in money or staff time. Tree inventory software programs are also expensive, and problems may be encountered when trying to integrate new inventory software with existing work order/call center management software. Factors other than cost may play a role in the prevalence of inventories. Urban foresters in cities with relatively small tree populations might think they can manage effectively without a tree inventory, considering the survey found that inventories became more common as city size increased.

Position

Urban forest managers in small cities tended to be about two or three steps removed from city leadership. In medium cities, they tended to be about three steps removed. In large or mega cities, they tended to be about four steps removed. The importance of the position of the urban forest manager relative to city leadership has been mentioned several time in the literature, where increased proximity is desirable (Johnson 1982; Thompson et al. 1994; Thompson 2006). Increased proximity to city leadership may improve a program’s chances when competing for funding.

However, researchers found that the distance from city leadership increased slightly as spending increased (Table 4). This implies that the urban forester’s proximity to city leadership may have less impact on spending rates than other potential factors, such as their ability to communicate effectively, the support their program receives from immediate superiors, and support from advocacy groups (e.g., tree boards or non-profit groups). These results found a clear trend of increased distance between city leadership and urban foresters as city size increases—attempts to decrease this distance may not be the most effective means of securing needed funding.

Johnson (1982) found that parks and recreation departments tended to be more understanding of the mission of urban forestry programs, although programs housed in public works departments tended to have more resources available to them. Thompson and Ahern (2000) conducted a survey of California communities in 1997 and found that almost 70% of urban forestry programs were housed in parks and recreation departments, and almost 30% in public works. In a case study of six cities, all with a population over 500,000 and spread across the U.S., Carroll (2003) found that four of those urban forestry programs were in the parks and recreation department (66%) and two were in public works (33%). These trends are very similar to the results from the Texas study, which found about 70% of urban forestry programs were housed in parks and recreation departments, and about 18% in public works.

However, in Texas, the cities with programs housed in public works were all small cities, with the exception of one medium city, one large city, and Austin (mega) reporting a scenario of shared responsibility between the two departments. Public works departments may often serve as a catch-all in smaller cities, being responsible for whatever tasks and infrastructure don’t fit precisely into another department’s expertise. This could explain why the survey found several small cities that had less than 1.0 FTE employee devoted to urban forestry (but still spent money on urban forestry) that housed their programs in the public works department.