STOCKTON, Calif. — Update: 8:15 p.m.
Stockton City Council voted 6-1 to move forward with removing 165 dead and unhealthy trees. Councilmember Brando Villapudua was the dissenting vote.
The project included removal of 567 stumps and pruning of nearly 24,000 trees.
Officials said the 165 trees are different from the 435 scheduled for removal for sidewalk repairs. They said these trees are tied to work orders that people had to submit to the city.
Original Story:
As the birds chirp in the tranquil Delta breeze sweeping through midtown Stockton, longtime resident Katya Evanhoe catches up with her friends.
Standing below the shade provided for decades by one of Stockton's estimated 92,000 city-owned trees, the calm conversation quickly jumps to a topic of controversy... its spray-painted white triangle.
"This is a beautiful pistache tree in my neighborhood, been here probably for 45 years," said Evanhoe while looking up. "These three trees behind me have been marked for kill by the city of Stockton."
The triangles aren't a new sight. They've popped up on trees around the city in recent weeks as part of the city's already-approved plan to cut down 435 trees in order to repair sidewalks, gutters and curbs.
Evanhoe and dozens of other community members packed recent city council meetings speaking in opposition to the plan and offering alternative ways to repair the sidewalks.
"Without these three trees, it will be a heat island," said Evanhoe. "We're going to badger and badger and badger and just continue to speak out until we can save these trees."
The protest worked briefly when city officials announced a pause in their tree removal plans, but days later, chainsaws across the city started buzzing again.
Now, nearly a month after the public backlash began, the city is proposing to cut down 165 more.
"Dismay and disgust. I feel that they are being reckless. They are using the analytic data and they're not thinking about people, especially children and seniors," Evanhoe reacted. "There's no thought involved at all."
This time, city staffers say the trees on the proposed chopping block are dead or unhealthy. For midtown resident Julie Dunning, the only thing that will be unhealthy is her neighborhood if the city moves forward with the current plans that don't include replanting the trees.
"There are impacts not only to health, (trees) are no longer there producing oxygen and absorbing CO2," said Dunning. "But there are also the heat impacts. They're doing this project right at the beginning of summer."
Without trees there to cool the cement, Dunning says she won't have any motivation to walk on the newly repaired sidewalks.
The new proposal will go before Stockton's City Council during its Tuesday meeting. Evanhoe says she and her friends will be there.
"Tuesday we'll be back at city council," said Evanhoe. "We are going to be losing our tree canopy and in a town like Stockton where the summers are severe, it's reckless... we're not going away."
Watch more from ABC10: Over 400 Stockton trees on chopping block as city plans to make repairs
