TREE BOARD MEETING

1 City of Lake Forest Park – Tree Board Meeting 2 Meeting Minutes: September 3, 2025; 7:00-9:00pm 3 Hybrid Meeting Held in the Forest Room at City Hall and Virtually via Zoom 4 5 Tree Board Members present: Richard Olmstead, Richard Saunders, Victoria Kutasz, Stacey 6 Spain, Doug Sprugel, and Mark Phillips 7 8 Staff and others present: Larry Goldman, LFP City Council; Elizabeth Talavers, Assistant Planner 9 10 Members of the Public present: Esther Goldstein 11 12 Tree Board Members absent: No members were absent. 13 14 Call to order: 7:00 PM 15 16 Short Reflection: Chair Phillips gave a short reflection on his trip to New Hampshire and the trees 17 he saw on the East coast including white pines and hemlocks. 18 19 Introductions: The Tree Board members introduced themselves. 20 21 Approval of Meeting Agenda: Chair Phillips suggested to add Tree Ordinance update to the 22 agenda. Board member Sprugel motioned to approve the agenda with the edits; Vice Chair Kutasz 23 seconded. The agenda was approved unanimously with the suggested edits. 24 25 Approval of Minutes: Vice Chair Kutasz requested to delete one paragraph from the minutes. 26 Board member Saunders motioned to approve the minutes with the suggested edits; and Board 27 member Sprugel seconded. The August 2025 minutes were approved unanimously. 28 29 Public Comment: Ms. Goldstein gave a public comment about worrying about the rates of tree 30 removals in the city. Ms. Goldstein suggested that the General Tree List should also encourage more 31 native trees. 32 33 The Tree Board members were able to respond to Ms. Goldstein’s comments about the tree 34 removal by providing information from the tree data that has been collected for the city. 35 36 Next meeting: The next meeting occurs on October 1, 2025. 37 38 Reports and Announcements: 39 Councilmember Goldman Update 40 Councilmember Goldman announced that the city has hired a new arborist, Sam Kull. Mr. Goldman 41 also announced that the Planning Commission is set to adopt the Climate Element by their next 42 meeting. 43 44 City Staff Update 45 Ms. Talavera announced that the new city permitting system is now live on the city’s website for all 46 applications. 47 48 1  1 Old Business: 2 SFI grant - follow-up 3 Chair Phillips and Vice Chair Kutasz met with Mike from DC about concerns of staff availability 4 and the availability of funding from DC. Vice Chair Kutasz let the Tree Board members that SFI 5 requested a letter from the city to let SFI know that the city intends to accept the funds from the 6 grant. Vice Chair Kutasz then moved that the Tree Board make a recommendation to Council to 7 accept the funds of the SFI grant, board member Spain seconded and the motion was approved 8 unanimously. Chair Phillips volunteered to work on a draft for the letter with Director Hofman. 9 10 King Conservation District canopy assessment - follow-up 11 The Tree Board members went over all the options for the KCD canopy mapping and weighed 12 which layers to prioritize for the city. 13 14 Confirm plan for the TB table at Picnic in the Park (Sept. 6th) 15 Vice Chair Kutasz stated that she has all the supplies ready for the event. Vice Chair Kutasz and 16 board member Spain volunteered for the morning shift during the Picnic in the Park and the 17 Farmer’s Market event on October 5th. Chair Phillips and board member Olmstead volunteered for 18 the latter shifts. 19 20 New Business: 21 22 Agenda for Next Meeting: The Board will be discussing SFI grant - follow-up, King Conservation 23 District canopy assessment - follow-up, recruiting ideas, and checking in with the 2025 Work Plan. 24 25 Adjournment: Board member Olmstead motioned to end the meeting and board member Sprugel 26 seconded. 27 28 Meeting adjourned at 9:00 PM 29 30 APPROVED: 31 32 ______________________ 33 Mark Phillips, Chair 34 35 2