Why Should Delaware Care?
Thousands of acres of trees, which soak up carbon and mitigate flooding, have been cleared in Sussex County over the past 20 years, primarily because of the building boom in the eastern part of the county. Proposed new rules would protect some of the existing forests, but may make it harder to build in some areas.
After losing thousands of acres of forestland in recent decades, Sussex County is considering new rules to require builders to preserve a portion of the trees that sit on their land.
The Sussex County Council debated the proposal earlier this month during a meeting that was attended by more than 20 residents who said they came to “speak for the trees.”
They donned stickers that said “no forest, no future.” Some spoke about the pain they felt when they saw trees being cut down in their neighborhoods.
“I’m a fifth-generation Sussex Countian who owns land, who farms, and I don’t even recognize my home anymore,” Georgetown resident Nathanael Wilson said. “This is breadcrumbs compared to what should have been done years ago.”
Ultimately, the council members deferred their final decision on the ordinance. They could vote on the measure in the coming weeks.
Under the proposal, the county would require developers to preserve between 30% and 50% of the existing trees on their properties. In the county’s designated growth zones, where officials want to direct development, the percentage of preserved trees would be 30%.
The proposed rules came from the recommendations of the Sussex County Land Use Reform Working Group, which has been tasked by the County Council with recommending reforms to Sussex County development.
The rules would also allow developers to clear trees beyond the proposed limit if they plant on the same site at least twice the amount of trees they cut down. That section of the proposal drew pushback from the public.
Steve Sinclair, speaking on behalf of the conservation group Sussex Preservation Coalition, argued that mature trees are much more valuable for the local environment. He said developers should have to prove they don’t have any other option but to cut them down.
“You can’t replace the value of mature trees with new tree plantings,” Sinclair said.
President of the Delaware Homebuilders Association Jon Horner also opposed that clause, but for a different reason. He said the limited space on properties will sometimes make it very difficult for developers to plant all of the new trees on the same site.
“We don’t love clear-cutting properties because we love the sound of timber snapping,” Horner said. “If we have to cut trees, it’s typically either to make the houses actually fit on the lot or because of our stormwater regulations.”
Instead, Horner proposed that the county in some cases allow developers to pay a large fee that could go towards preserving mature forests in other parts of the county. In response, some residents at the hearing said they feared that such a fee could lead to whole areas of the county without many trees.
Trees naturally sequester carbon dioxide, helping with the fight against climate change. And forests act as a shield against major flooding events by reducing erosion and soaking up water.
Delaware State Forester Kyle Hoyd said the state environmental agency recently conducted a study that found Sussex County has lost 21,000 acres of forestland over the past two decades — about half of an original estimate that had been based on federal data.
Hoyd called the decline “drastic”, even the loss of forestland was not as great as the agency originally believed,
The lost forestland is equal to 3.5% of the total land area of the county and about 16,000 football fields.
