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The Rehoboth Beach commissioners upheld a decision by the city’s Parks and Shade Tree Commission to allow a Hickman Street couple to cut down 12 trees.
That decision came only after a debate over how the hearing was to be held. City solicitor Glenn Mandalas ruled the hearing should be heard as if the commissioners were the parks and shade tree commission and not based on the record of the previous hearing. Mandalas said hearing it this way would make it easier for Superior Court to make a ruling, should the case be heard there.
Commissioner Dennis Barbour wanted to table the hearing altogether, saying the commissioners should clear up whether tree-appeal cases should be heard de novo, as Mandalas suggested, or on the record of the previous hearing. The commissioners voted 5-1 to go forward with the hearing with Barbour the only no vote and Commissioner Stan Mills recusing himself because his wife, Marcia Maldeis, is on the parks and shade tree commission.
The tree ordinance does not say who can appeal a decision by the parks and shade tree commission, only that an appeal must be filed in writing within 30 days of the commission’s decision. J. Michael Craig, a Rehoboth resident, filed the appeal via a letter to the commissioners. Craig was not present at the appeal hearing because, he said, he was out of town on business. In his letter, Craig said he was concerned because there was no basis for the removal in the tree ordinance and because minutes of the parks and shade tree commission’s meeting were not available to the public, which he said was suspicious.
Property owners, Andy and Kathy Liverman of 120 Hickman St., said they were not asking to cut down the trees for the sake of cutting them down but were trying to improve their property.
Andy Liverman said brush has been growing under the trees dating back 20 years and standing water was attracting mosquitoes. Liverman said they wanted to take some of the large trees down because they were preventing the family from opening their porch windows while other trees were diseased or dying. He said they had altered their plan to preserve more trees on the property, even though their arborist from Sussex Tree told them they would have to be taken down in a few years.
Ritchie Thurmond, a certified arborist from Sussex Tree, said he had inspected the property and found that the trees the Livermans wanted to cut down were causing a nuisance, impinging on the foundation of the house and the garage and ruining the aesthetics of the house. Thurmond said some of the other trees were diseased and would likely be dead soon. He said after removing the requested trees, the property would still have 10 trees on it.
When the commissioners deliberated their decision, two motions were made.
Commissioner Kathy McGuiness made a motion to allow the Livermans to cut down seven of the trees and then Commissioner Paul Kuhns amended that motion to include the remaining five trees because they were hazardous and a nuisance.
Barbour said the trees did not represent a material nuisance and by voting on the amendment, the commissioners were creating a variance from the code. Commissioner Pat Coluzzi said two of the five trees in Kuhns’ motion should come down but didn’t know whether the remaining three trees constituted a nuisance.
The commissioners voted 4-2 for Kuhns’ amendment allowing 12 trees to be removed and then voted 5-1 on McGuiness’ original motion, with Barbour the only no vote.
Thurmond said the Livermans were open to any mitigation the commissioners may have in mind. Mandalas said the building and licensing department should be able to determine what the mitigation should be.
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