Gainesville City Commission adopts ad hoc committees, discusses tree removal concerns

[Editor’s note: Due to the large number of meetings in the first part of August, we were not able to cover them all right away, and we are going back through them as time permits.]

BY JENNIFER CABRERA

GAINESVILLE, Fla. – At the August 6 Gainesville City Commission meeting, Commissioners established ad hoc committees for solid waste and environmental resiliency, discussed citizen concerns about tree removal, and renamed the Office of Equity and Inclusion to the Equal Opportunity Office.

Ad hoc committees

Mayor Harvey Ward referred to a discussion at the previous meeting about the idea of an ad hoc solid waste committee and said he thought it was “a good opportunity” for a three-member committee if enough Commissioners were interested.

Commissioner Cynthia Chestnut said she was “very interested” in serving on the solid waste committee, and Commissioner Bryan Eastman said, “I like the idea of having these committees.” Eastman said the committees would provide a way to discuss proposed policies, hear from the community, and “be able to chew on stuff” because City Commission meetings aren’t “a great venue for… in-depth conversations about these bigger questions.” He supported having a sunset date for the committees but added, “We are not stopping solid waste as a community, and then the environmental committee, in a similar way, so are these kind of standing committees?”

Ward said his vision was to have both committees “on an ad hoc basis, not a standing committee.” His recommendation was to start the solid waste committee right away and sunset it at the end of March 2027. He added, “I’m uncomfortable with a standing committee structure because we frankly don’t have the staff support in this day to support that.” He said he would be very interested in serving on an environmental resiliency subcommittee.

“Reinventing” the General Policy Committee

Ward also supported “reinventing” the General Policy Committee (GPC) to “not just being another Commission meeting, but being an opportunity where all of us have the opportunity… to talk about what we’re working on and what ideas we have, what ideas the community has brought to us, and having a more formal opportunity to bubble things up and work through them as a body.”

Ward said the GPC meetings would still be an opportunity for Commissioners to take action if needed, “but [it would act] primarily as a policy committee.”

Commissioner James Ingle said he was interested in the solid waste committee because a new contract is being considered and the billing is moving to property tax bills.

Responding to a question about whether this would negatively affect staff, Interim City Manager Andrew Persons said staff would “be there to support it and be able to do the work… However you decide to organize your discussion, staff’s role is to support that with analysis and with recommendations.”

Eastman said committees could also take on policies like “annexations,… something that has been kind of sitting out there, lingering. It’s such a can of worms that you’ve got to figure out what the scope of that looks like… We had a number of Land Development Code updates that have gone to our staff… Some of them were broad, some of them were narrow, but they’ve kind of been out there for a while… I’d like for us to schedule something where we can talk about this more in depth.” He said committees could also get updates on priorities “that might not bog down our City Commission meetings as much.” He said that reformatting the GPC meeting and having more ad hoc committees “might be the way to do it.”

Eastman said it would be important for the committee members to tell staff what they want to work on and then “be disciplined, ourselves, to say, ‘Mission accomplished,’ or ‘Let’s continue on until we are done.'”

Ward said his proposal was for a “more formalized process” for Commissioners to bring ideas forward. He said a lot of questions have come up about solid waste, so it was clear to him that there is a need for an opportunity for Commissioners to have those conversations. 

Motion

Ingle made a motion to establish an ad hoc committee for solid waste, with multiple seconds. Eastman suggested appointing committee members as part of the motion, but Ward said he would appoint the members: “That’s how we normally do committees.” Ward asked for a sunset date to be added to the motion, and the motion was amended to sunset the committee on March 31, 2027. 

Ward said he’d heard interest from Chestnut, Ingle, Willits, and Eastman, and “I’m happy to let y’all run with it.”

Ingle added an environmental resiliency committee to the motion, and the motion passed 6-0, with Commissioner Desmon Duncan-Walker absent. Ward said he and Eastman would serve on the environmental resiliency committee, and Commissioner Ed Book said he would also serve through the end of the year. 

Tree removal

In the general public comment period of the afternoon session, two people brought up concerns with tree removal on the site of the Southwest Public Safety Center building and along NE 9th Street. Persons said the Public Works Department would be “making some changes to its internal processes related to public capital improvement projects, with respect to trees.” He said those processes would include the City Engineer, Arborist, and “other key staff,” along with additional notification to nearby residents and communication in meetings of the Tree Advisory Board. He concluded, “We feel this is a very good change to our internal processes that will strengthen the overall capital improvement project process and be able to, at different stages of that, make sure that we’re being as thoughtful with planning and tree preservation as we can.”

Interim Chief Operating Officer Brian Singleton said the City has offered to “do additional plantings” to create a buffer near neighboring properties of the Southwest Public Safety Center site, along with a privacy fence on the rear of the neighboring lots, if the property owners want that. He said about 120 trees will be replanted on that site. 

Singleton said the City is still working on the replanting plan for NE 9th Street.

Interim Chief Operating Officer Singleton on the Southwest Public Safety Center: “City staff does not want to remove trees if we do not have to. Unfortunately, the site just did not allow for us to go about it in a different way.”

Singleton also said the Southwest Public Safety Center site was “a very challenging site. The topography of the site did not allow us to redevelop it without doing a significant amount of earthwork, which resulted in the requirements to remove the trees. City staff does not want to remove trees if we do not have to. Unfortunately, the site just did not allow for us to go about it in a different way.”

Mayor Harvey Ward: “Nobody in Gainesville gets elected without understanding that we have to take care of the tree canopy… We are serious about replacing trees as best we can, keeping trees in large chunks of land from being touched in the first place, and considering very carefully what comes down and what doesn’t.”

Ward said he didn’t want anyone “to walk away from… this meeting,… thinking, ‘Oh, they’re just trying to blow this off.’ We are absolutely not. Nobody in Gainesville gets elected without understanding that we have to take care of the tree canopy… Over the last decade,… we have put nearly 2,000 acres into permanent, actively-managed conservation inside the city limits of Gainesville. That’s not common. We plant or give away… thousands of trees, every single year… Since I’ve been up here, I don’t think we’ve ever said no to a land conservation opportunity… We are serious about replacing trees as best we can, keeping trees in large chunks of land from being touched in the first place, and considering very carefully what comes down and what doesn’t.”

Ward added that the Southwest Public Safety Center was placed on “the most appropriate piece of land we could find, and that still required way more tree removal than anybody wanted.”

Motion

Eastman made a motion to:

1. Implement the process improvements outlined in Persons’ August 5th tree removal memo to improve communication on tree removals and strengthen tree protection and mitigation.
2. Direct staff to review and refer to the Environmental Resiliency Subcommittee the Tree Advisory Board’s recommendations to strengthen the City’s processes for street trees in the right-of-way.
3. Create a plan for restoring and enhancing the tree canopy along the NE 9th Street corridor.
4. Implement the replanting plan and buffer plan for the Southwest Public Safety Center.
5. Refer this to the Environmental Resiliency Subcommittee

Willits seconded the motion.

The motion passed 6-0, with Duncan-Walker absent.

Ward added, ” I really appreciate the way staff has responded in this situation over the last few days. I know that our staff cares about the issue and has taken it all very personally as well… There is good criticism, and then there’s meanness, and the staff has been subjected to some meanness, and I really hope that as a community we can back off of that stuff. That’s not okay.”

Renaming the Office of Equity and Inclusion

The Commission also passed an ordinance on second reading to rename the Office of Equity and Inclusion to the Equal Opportunity Office; the motion passed 6-0.

---

The information below was sent to Commissioners to assist them in responding to residents’ tree removal concerns:

NE Ninth Street

The City of Gainesville is providing updated information regarding tree removals associated with the NE Ninth Street bicycle lane project. The project originally included the planned removal of eight trees within the public right-of-way to construct continuous bike lanes through the intersections at NE 16th Avenue and NE 23rd Avenue. Those removals were reviewed by the Tree Advisory Board in December 2023 and were included in the project approved by the City Commission in July 2024.

As construction progressed, crews identified eight additional right-of-way trees that stood in the way of the bike lane improvements. Public Works reports that four of those trees have been saved. Two were saved the week of July 20, 2026, when Public Works crews realized they could realign the adjacent driveways and keep the trees. Two more were saved with redesign work in the field in response to neighbor concerns. In total, 12 trees including one palm tree were removed along the corridor rather than the 15 reported late yesterday.

All of the trees involved in this project were located within the public right-of-way. Trees in the right-of-way are managed differently from regulated trees on public or private parcels because they are part of the transportation corridor and must be evaluated in conjunction with roadway design, utility infrastructure and public safety needs. Public Works is updating the project webpage to reflect the final tree removals and confirms that no additional tree removals are planned for the project.

Lot 13

We understand your concern about the tree removal downtown.

The Public Works Department made a mistake while working in Lot 13 and accidentally took down a tree without direction from the management team. This lapse in communication has been addressed and staff have been spoken to about the error.

The tree mitigation fee is being calculated and will be transferred to the tree mitigation fund. Additionally, one or more trees will be planted in the area to make up for the loss.

Also, as a part of the Streatery construction, a second tree was removed from Lot 13 to provide an exit for cars leaving the State Attorney’s lot when SW First Ave was closed to vehicle traffic. A tree mitigation fee will be paid for this tree as well.

NE Eighth Ave

We understand your concern about the tree removal on Eighth Avenue.

The cypress trees on NE Eighth Avenue had to be removed in order to proceed with construction of the new Fire Station #3. This is a necessary public safety project to strengthen fire and emergency response services across the city.

Construction required the removal of 23 regulated trees. In accordance with city ordinance, the city paid a tree mitigation fee of $102,940.96. The completed site will include the planting of 16 native trees. A total of 45% of existing heritage trees are being preserved. A revised sidewalk design has been implemented to avoid root impacts and allow the preservation of four existing heritage live oak trees that had previously been identified for removal along NE Eighth Ave.

The 16,773-square-foot firehouse with three engine bays is being built near the intersection of NE Eighth Avenue and Waldo Road, just west of the existing station. Once completed, the new facility will replace the current station with infrastructure that supports today’s emergency response operations.

SW Public Safety Center

We share our community’s love of trees and environmental stewardship and recognize neighbors’ concerns regarding the number of trees being removed as construction begins on the Southwest Public Safety Center. The site was selected in southwest Gainesville to meet the operational needs of this growing area of the city and to improve emergency response capabilities.

Construction required the removal of 521 regulated trees. In accordance with city ordinance, the city paid a tree mitigation fee of $959,582.87. The completed site will include the planting of 124 native trees.

The project requires space not only for the public safety center, but also for emergency vehicle access, parking, stormwater management and utility infrastructure that support 24-hour operations.

A key component of the project is the construction of two stormwater ponds designed to protect water quality, manage increased stormwater runoff and accommodate the existing floodplain so stormwater does not increase flooding of nearby areas and roadways.

The project, including its stormwater management system and supporting infrastructure, was designed to meet engineering standards, safety requirements, and all applicable state and local regulations while supporting a critical public safety facility that will serve the community for decades to come.