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　　Leafy Lake Oswego has one of the area's most stringent tree-preservation codes. In fact, most of those surveyed consider it too stringent. City Council, to its credit, launched a code-review project last year with the intention of reducing the regulatory burden for property owners and the administrative burden for city staff. The recommendations of the volunteer code-review committee are now before Council, which would best address the frustrations of local homeowners by adopting the minority report.

　　The current code treats trees differently according to their size. Little trees — those less than 5 inches in diameter at breast height — may be cut down without the city's say-so. Medium trees — 5 inches to 10 inches in diameter — may be cut down without much bother. However, homeowners generally may cut down only two such trees per year. Finally, big trees — those over 10 inches in diameter — are afforded sweeping protections. Homeowners may cut down dead trees, hazardous trees, and they may cut down large trees in the pursuit of a landscape-management plan. But in most cases, big trees are sacrosanct. You can't even chop one down to preserve a view for which you may have paid a premium.

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　　or 503-221-8142.Unfortunately, these restrictions — including those that preserve trees that block your view — would be kept largely intact by the proposed code revision recommended by the tree committee's majority. The proposal does loosen things up a bit — threshold diameters in the medium- and big-tree categories are slightly larger, for instance. By and large, though, it's a very modestly reworked version of an overly rigid — and for that reason, unpopular — code. It still would prohibit the issuance of a permit to cut a large tree solely to preserve or create a view.

　　If City Council really wants to address the frustration of many homeowners who encounter the code, it will adopt the streamlined and sensible proposal supported by a handful of the tree committee's members. Their proposal, in a nutshell: Allow homeowners to cut up to three trees of any size per year, with some exceptions (heritage trees, for instance). If they want to cut more than that, they may apply to do so using preservation guidelines now in place.

　　The three-tree safety valve, the minority group argues in a letter to City Council, will reduce unintended consequences created by the overly stringent code itself. Homeowners avoid planting certain types of trees, they note, because they know it's not in their interest to do so. Eventually, they'll become large enough to gain code protection, and their owners "will lack the freedom to manage their own trees."

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　　Such annual cut allowances are common features of other cities' tree codes, the minority group notes, and even Lake Oswego provides a six-tree annual allowance to owners of forested tracts over an acre. So why not extend the courtesy to people who own homes on a fraction of an acre?

　　Doing so would, among other things, alleviate the big-trees-in-your-view problem. It's not an exaggeration to say that some people in Lake Oswego have paid for multimillion-dollar views, says Tracy Marx, one of the code committee's seven contrarians.

　　"If a tree is taking that away," asks Marx, "why in the world can you not take the tree out?"

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　　It's a good question and one Lake Oswego's city councilors will take seriously if they hope to produce a tree code that will address the frustrations expressed by most of their constituents.