The removal of a 125-year-old silver maple in front of the Old Forge building on Tinker Street has renewed debate about Town Supervisor Bill McKenna’s singular leadership style, Woodstock laws, and how to balance public safety with preservation.
J&J Tree Works of Saugerties cut down the tree on Thursday after Highway Superintendent Donald Allen determined that its removal was necessary, according to McKenna. One of its branches fell last year, almost hitting a pedestrian, and another broke this year, causing a power outage that cost almost $30,000 to repair.
Under Woodstock’s tree law, they can be removed without informing the town board if the highway department makes such a decision or if they pose imminent danger. Woodstock’s Tree Committee says the maple posed an emergency only because McKenna wanted it to be.
“I am so tired and pissed off about people misreading things,” McKenna said in an interview. “It’s either-or in the law. And we have both, because the highway superintendent came down here and looked at the tree and said it’s a liability.”
Yet the street was never closed and no caution tape had been installed since the tree’s branches fell, said Tree Committee Chair Michael Veitch. Better care could have prolonged the tree’s life, according to Veitch.
“If Bill is unwilling to follow the town’s laws, he should pack up and leave,” Veitch said. “The big shade trees give back a lot to the communities, and to lose them is a big deal.”
McKenna is already under fire for failing to notify the board that Michael Innello, a maintenance worker hired this year, is a Level 3 sex offender. McKenna reversed an attempt by the board to fire the worker, who is back on the Woodstock payroll, and says he’s trying to ensure that a convicted felon could have the chance to rebuild his life.
Certified arborist Vern Rist, who has operated Healthy Trees LLC in West Saugerties for more than 35 years, said the maple might have been saved. He wasn’t called in on this case, but noted that the entire tree would need to be evaluated to determine whether it posed imminent danger.
“A tree can still be structurally sound with a hollow core,” Rist said. “The center of all big trees are dead. Just because the heartwood is decayed doesn’t mean the tree is dead.”
In his view, a tree can often be stabilized through cabling or canopy reduction, measures that cost less than emergency repairs. “In my treehugging opinion, it’s worth saving a tree,” he said. “Routine maintenance, taking out deadwood, keeps branches healthier. Preventative maintenance is probably cheaper than fixing it after the fact.”
Rist, who holds a Ph.D. in plant pathology from Cornell University, is currently working with the Woodstock Cemetery Committee on treatments for sugar maples there.
While the tree’s removal was lawful, McKenna should have notified Veitch’s committee, said Bennet Ratcliff, the town board’s liaison to the tree group and one of three board members who voted to fire Innello.
“While the tree committee should have been notified, they weren’t,” Ratcliff said. “And the person who should have notified them is the supervisor, and he didn’t. It’s just another example of his failure to communicate.”
Ratcliff also faulted the town for neglecting its trees.
“The town of Woodstock offers almost no money at all to upkeep and care for the trees,” he said. “And when they die, they start to fall, they cut off the power and they’re a hazard.”
The committee’s pleas to the board for more funds have been rejected, and the town should allot money to hire an arborist, Ratcliff said. The group’s budget operates on money that committee member Gay Leonhardt helped discover in a memorial fund about four years ago.
Beyond this tree, Leonhardt said the maple was part of a generation of old shade trees in Woodstock that need attention. “Yes, it was an old tree. And it’s part of a generation of silver maples that are all old and also beloved, big, and shading a lot of town,” she said. She urged the town to bring in an arborist to assess the other aging maples before they too become emergencies.
Another board member, Laura Ricci, said whether a tree poses danger can be a matter of opinion. Still, communication and replacement remain essential.
“There is a tree law, there is a tree committee,” she said. “It’s an advisory committee. I would see the town board as still having the final say, but the tree committee would weigh in and give advice. So in a perfect world, the tree committee would have been notified.”
Noah Eckstein is the editor-in-chief of The Overlook. Send correspondence to noah@theoverlooknews.com.