The Impacts of a City Council Trees-Related Decision
Trees for Life Oregon is tracking the effects of last summer’s City Council ruling that transferred Parks/Urban Forestry’s (UF) permitting and regulation team to the Portland Permitting and Development Bureau (PP&D). Our concern about this change is its possible negative effects on protecting, preserving, and expanding tree canopy. These are goals that the Council supported when it voted unanimously to approve the latest Urban Forestry Plan in fall 2025.
But PP&D’s mandate and systems have always been geared toward reviewing development permits, not protecting tree canopy. Under pressure from the state for cities to expedite new housing permits, some actions (via the Code Alignment project) have already been taken locally to loosen tree regulations in some situations. This is happening despite the fact that Portland’s trees and tree code are not what’s preventing developers from resuming previous levels of building here, contrary to an outdated trope that blames canopy protections for decreased development permits.
Here’s what we learned about the transfer of the Urban Forestry permitting and regulation team out of the Portland Parks & Bureau from Robert Irving, interim manager of PP&D’s new Tree Permitting division. He presented these impacts to date to the Urban Forestry Commission at its November 20, 2025 meeting.
Staff Attrition
Since June 2025, City budget and political factors have reduced the number of City staff engaged in tree-related permitting and code regulation. The main driver was a City Council-approved/Councilor Eric Zimmerman-initiated budget amendment that TFLO strongly opposed. Read why here. The move has exacerbated budget cuts that had already reduced staff numbers. In September 2025 the City eliminated 10 Urban Forestry positions. Five UF permitting and regulation staff slated to move to PP&D on October 1 resigned, and 2 more resigned after the move took place. Our understanding is that at least some of those resignations were due to staff unease about the move. A number of UF “positions” that were transferred to PP&D were already vacant (due to funding), and adding to the problem, just when the move took place the City implemented a citywide hiring freeze.
The staff numbers that Robert Irving presented but didn’t provide in writing were confusing. But the upshot is that of the 32 filled UF positions that existed prior to the shift, 23 are now in PP&D’s new Tree Permitting division. (A few years ago 7 other UF staff had already moved over to PP&D; 1 since resigned, leaving 6.)
Service Level Impacts
Reductions in staff have led to slower service for the Portland public. The impacts below that Robert Irving reported occurred between July 2025 and late November 2025.
Non-development permit decisions: The time lapse between request and tree inspectors initiating their work went from 2 weeks to 6 weeks.
Planting verifications: The time lapse between request for a removal/replanting permit and inspections went from 6 or 7 weeks to 8 weeks. Said Irving, “Once the applicant gets a permit to remove a tree, they have a year to replant; if we don’t get verification that the tree has been replanted, we follow up 8 weeks after that year is up.”
Code compliance for emergency response inspections: Response time went from 3 weeks to 5 weeks.
Code compliance team phone call responses: Response time went from 2 days to 5 days.
Administrative review requests: These went from 4 weeks to 8 weeks.
Intake, support, and analysis team response time [823-TREE and trees@portlandoregon.gov]: The response time to queries and requests went from 1 day to 2 or 3 days.
Effect on the Heritage Tree Program
Irving reported that, for now, Portland’s Heritage Tree Program remains within UF. But permitting for those trees on private property lies within PP&D, and permitting for Heritage street trees is still within UF.
A Tool for Monitoring Ongoing Impacts?
PP&D’s Robert Irving says that in January the new Tree Permitting division will be working on developing a “dashboard,” and he has asked TFLO for input into the information it might display. We have already shared with PP&D a list of questions related to service and canopy impacts that we hope they will track. It’s still unclear what that dashboard will look like, says Irving, and whether all the data it holds will be made accessible to the public.
PP&D’s New Tree Permitting Division Structure
FYI, Irving provided this information about each of the division’s four sections:
PP&D Land Use Division: Handles on-site tree density standards during development, and the tree preservation standards for trees on private properties.
Intake, support and analysis: This comprises the team responding to public inquiries via 503-823-8733 (TREE) and trees@portlandoregon.gov. It has 4 full-time staff, down from 7 when this service was housed in UF. Staff includes 1 interim supervisor, 5 tree techs (2 of those positions are vacant), 1 business system analyst, and 1 administrative specialist (position is vacant). This group also staffs 15-minute appointments and meets with customers. Although this single-point-of-contact hotline and email are now part of PP&D, that bureau issues orders to UF staff for relevant tree maintenance.
Non-development: This section has 6 full-time staff.
Development and capital improvement projects (CIP): This section comprises a merging of staff from the UF’s former Major, Capital & Maintenance group and UF’s Permitting & Regulation team together with PP&D’s Urban Forestry section. The development staff review private property development and public works permits. The CIP group mainly reviews capital improvement projects and other City projects. This section has a total of 7 full-time staff. They have an interim supervisor (Robert Irving’s former position); 1 senior tree inspector (which is vacant), and 7 tree inspectors, 1 of which is vacant. These staff are responsible for early assistance prior to building permit applications; street tree requirements during review of building and public works permits; street tree preservation for building, demolition, and public works permits; street tree preservation and planting during land use reviews; inspection of on-site tree protection before start of development; street tree pruning and root pruning permits; inspection of violation complaints associated with development; post-construction; final inspection of public works permits; and warranty inspections for those public works permits.
Compliance: This section has 6 full-time staff—3 code specialists and 3 tree inspectors. They’re responsible for inspecting requests and complaints; tree follow up; post-emergency response inspections; removal/replant follow up; investigating and enforcing dead, dying, and dangerous trees including elms reported or suspected of having Dutch elm disease or ashes reported or suspected of having EAB; tree work done without permits; and meeting with property owners who have requests about their trees.