The battle for Seattle's trees is beginning

The Emerald City isn't so green after all.

Since 1972 Seattle has lost nearly 1.7 million trees — more than half of all the trees standing then, according to a new city report.

Homeowners ax them for a better view. Developers cut them to make way for houses and condos. Diseases and pests claim their share, aided by neglect from landowners and city managers alike.

Ivy and blackberry vines choke city parkland. Aging maples nearing the end of their lives make up much of the city's forests.

"Does something to destroy the myth of a green Seattle, doesn't it?" said John Healy, spokesman for the city's Office of Sustainability and Environment.

It also has deprived the city of the benefits of trees, which filter water, soak up pollution and act as heat shields on sunny days. The city estimates the trees lost in the last three decades would have done air cleaning and water storage worth more than $25 million a year.

Now, to help reverse the loss, the city wants to add roughly 650,000 more trees over the next 30 years. That goal and the basic outlines of how to get there are in a draft plan being announced today by Mayor Greg Nickels. The plan lays out a broad strategy for managing Seattle trees on both public and private property.

It calls for better care of trees in parks, forests and along streets. It envisions more incentives and education to encourage private landowners to save and plant trees. It also sets the stage for further regulations to limit tree loss — including possible restrictions on tree-cutting on private property.

"This is an attempt to fix a problem," said Steve Nicholas, head of the Office of Sustainability and Environment, which produced the report. "We have a really important resource, and to date the city's response has been out of sync."

The push to save trees comes as the city works to boost housing density — initiatives that could conflict.

The twin goals of more trees and more housing are compatible, said Tim Trohimovich, planning director of Futurewise, a Seattle-based environmental group that promotes growth management.

"Sometimes you have to reconfigure development; sometimes you're looking at smaller footprints and taller buildings, but you can do it," he said.

But Jim Potter, head of a development company that specializes in building apartments and condominiums in Seattle, questioned how adding housing and adding trees would happen simultaneously.

"It's easy to say those words, but us builders are where the rubber meets the roads. Tell us how to do that," said Potter, chairman of Kauri Investments.

Much of the recovery would have to happen on private property and in the single-family neighborhoods that dominate the city, say city officials.

That's where many of the trees have probably been lost, Nicholas said. It's also where the city hopes to replace many of those trees.

Right now, there are few limits on what people can do to trees on private property, unless a tree is exceptionally large and valuable, or near an ecologically sensitive area.

While most tree-cutting goes unpublicized, a few cases have caught the public's attention. A federal judge paid more than $600,000 to the city after having trees cut in Colman Park that had blocked a view from his property.

The city itself came under attack last year for cutting more than 10 mature trees during a remodeling of Occidental Square, in downtown Seattle.

Today, Nickels is expected to announce several measures to kick off the conservation effort. The city will give away 2,000 free-tree coupons in October to people who apply online, or at city community centers and libraries. And city departments will plant trees in the Georgetown and Rainier Beach neighborhoods.

Nickels plans to convene a task force to help craft incentives and regulations to preserve trees and get more planted.

It would cost $114 million in tree-plantings plus $7 million more a year in maintenance to achieve the 30-year goals spelled out in the plan, according to the city. That's balanced against a roughly $14 million estimated increase in benefits from things such as clean water and air.

The mayor's budget for 2007 and 2008, to be unveiled later this month, is expected to contain new proposed spending on trees totaling $4.4 million. Much of that would go toward planting and pruning trees in parks and public spaces, and rehabilitating urban forestland.

Warren Cornwall: 206-464-2311 or wcornwall@seattletimes.com