::: COMMUNITY NEWS

Deadline passes, airport trees are still standing

Published Friday, March 16, 2007

The March 15 deadline for cutting down more than 200 trees at Rancho Murieta Airport has passed and the trees are still standing.

The trees' latest reprieve came in the form of a stop-work order issued by the state Department of Fish and Game on the same day the county held a media event for the cutting of the first tree. Fish and Game is requiring the county to get a stream bed alteration permit before the work can proceed.

"Fish and Game is going to take a much bigger look at what we're doing so we're going to need to have much more information about the resource," said Jill Ritzman, deputy parks director. "I know what our next steps are going to be. I just don't know what the outcome is going to be."

Ritzman said the first step in the process is to hire a firm to do an assessment of the area that complies with the requirements of the California Environmental Quality Act.

The trees that grow on the strip of land between the Cosumnes River and the 3,800-foot runway include 200-year-old native oaks and rare stands of 100-year-old Northern California black walnut trees. A 2003 preliminary environmental study characterized the trees as a substantial part of a riparian forest that provides "valuable nesting and roosting habitat" for many species, including more than half a dozen birds protected by federal or state law.

"This is larger than saving black walnuts and heritage oaks. This is part of an ecosystem," said Megan McPherson, county communications and media director. "You take those trees out and that riparian corridor is damaged. You're not going to be able to replicate the kind of habitat that's there now. …This is the kind of decision you can't just undo once the trees are cut."

The county is required to remove the trees under a court order obtained by the privately owned airport. Caltrans suspended the airport's night operations permit in 2001 because of the safety hazard posed by the trees, and a struggle between the airport and the county parks department over the fate of the trees intensified during a series of hearings before the county Board of Supervisors in 2002 and 2003.

Airport counsel Arthur J. Negrette did not respond to requests for comment.

The county was working towards the March 15 deadline to complete the work during the dormant period of the valley elderberry longhorn beetle, a threatened species that lives in the elderberry bushes in the area. Most of the almost $620,000 cost of the project is earmarked for habitat restoration for the beetle. The costs are the county's responsibility, according to the court decision.