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City Installs Warning Signs at the Tree

Aug 4, 2024

For Immediate Release                                                                      4 August 2024

 

Contact:

Michelle Peterson, 360 878-7689, michellepeterson.RN@gmail.com

Ronda Larson Kramer, 360 259-3076, ronda@larsonlawpllc.com

 

Reports and background documents under Media Resources  Save the Davis Meeker Garry Oak 

 

 

 

City of Tumwater Reduces Speed Limit Under the Davis Meeker Oak


DATELINE— TUMWATER, WA

Over the weekend, the City of Tumwater posted street signs on Old Highway 99 at the controversial Davis Meeker oak tree, reducing the speed limit to 30 miles per hour and warning that limbs may fall.  


Michelle Peterson, spokesperson for a citizen activist group working to stop the mayor from cutting down the tree, said the group welcomed this move. “We hope this signals a change by the mayor toward mitigation and away from cutting down the tree,” she said. “Changing surrounding infrastructure rather than removing the tree is a win-win for the community and the mayor.”


Musician Dana Lyons will hold a CD release party on August 16 at which the group, Save the Davis Meeker Garry Oak, will have a silent auction with 20 two-year-old seedlings from the tree to raise money for legal fees.


The controversy surrounding the tree stems from a branch that dropped over a year ago on May 16, 2023. A photo taken by city workers immediately after it dropped shows the branch tips extending slightly into the roadway, while the majority of the branch fell directly under the tree.


The Washington State Department of Archaeology and Historic Preservation has told the city that it is legally prohibited from cutting down the tree without a permit. The Nisqually Tribe has also asked the city not to cut down the tree until the tribe has had an opportunity to review the situation.


Many view the tree as a critical piece of Tumwater’s pioneer history. It stood beside an ancient Native American trade route called the Cowlitz Trail, which later became a spur of the Oregon Trail.


Oral history of pioneer descendants indicates the tree may have been the go-to camping spot for newly arrived settlers. James Thomas is writing an article for the Thurston County Historical Journal on his ancestor T.J. Harper, who came west with Tumwater Pioneer Ezra Meeker. Meeker is the pioneer after whom the Davis Meeker oak was named.  


Thomas relates how Tumwater settlers George and Isabella Bush, whose farm was near the Davis Meeker oak, told the Meeker party to camp under the tree. “Mr. Bush suggested that they camp under the giant oak tree on unclaimed land just northwest of his home.  He said the surrounding prairie would provide browse for the livestock and a small lake, just to the east, would be a convenient place to water the stock.  My family believes that the Davis-Meeker oak, the largest in the area, is the one they camped under.”


Thomas said, “I would not be surprised if Mr. Bush often directed other new arrivals to camp at the oak tree because of the convenience of nearby water and food for livestock.” 


The Davis Meeker oak seedlings that will be auctioned off on August 16 were from acorns collected and grown by Burnt Ridge Nursery and Orchards.






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American Kestrels Fledge from the Davis Meeker Oak

Jul 26, 2024



For Immediate Release                                                                      26 July 2024

 

Contact:

Michelle Peterson, 360-878-7689, michellepeterson.RN@gmail.com 

Ronda Larson Kramer, 360-259-3076, rlarsonkramer@gmail.com

 

Reports and background documents under Media Resources  www.TumwaterOak.org 

 

Information Links: http://linktr.ee/TumwaterOak

Kestrel photos and videos

 

 

 

American Kestrels Fledge from the Davis Meeker Oak


DATELINE— TUMWATER, WA

Three kestrel chicks are about to fledge from the nest cavity in the Davis Meeker oak, a tree that has been at the center of one of the biggest tree controversies in Tumwater’s history. If Tumwater mayor Debbie Sullivan had succeeded in her plan to cut the tree down in May, the three chicks would not have survived.


On June 7, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service sent the city a letter stating, “It has come to our attention that the City of Tumwater, without a permit, intends to knowingly violate federal wildlife law by the removal” of the oak tree. The letter explained that the Migratory Bird Treaty Act does not allow cutting a tree down without a permit if the tree contains nesting migratory birds.


Professional tree risk assessment specialist Beowulf Browers noted in a legal declaration on July 2 that the City of Tumwater’s arborist had failed in his duty of care and diligence by neglecting “to recommend a biological survey of the tree to protect wildlife critical habitat.”


Steve Layman is a raptor biologist who visited the tree and saw the kestrel parents.  He said in a legal declaration that kestrels use nest cavities year after year, down through the generations. He explained that the availability of vacant holes is waning as old trees disappear from the landscape.


According to a March 31, 2019, article on All About Birds by Lauren Chambliss, kestrels nest in holes, and the scarcity of trees old enough to contain nest cavities is likely one cause in the population decline of our smallest falcon. The article documents data showing declines nearing 50 percent in American kestrel populations in North America.


An article in the New York Times by Catrin Einhorn on June 5, 2023, explains how kestrels are still common but their population numbers are declining every year, in contrast to other raptors such as bald eagles and peregrine falcons who have largely recovered after the elimination of DDT in the 1970s. Scientists are racing to learn more about where the birds might be having trouble.


“The future of all wildlife is in proximity to people,” said raptor biologist Layman. In his view, the Davis Meeker oak presents an opportunity: “Schoolchildren could be brought there and taught about ecology and could take its acorns and plant them in their yards and in parks.”


Whether the tree will remain standing remains unclear, however. The citizen group Save the Davis Meeker Garry Oak (SDMGO) is raising funds to hire an environmental attorney to try and save it. “The mayor says she wants another arborist to assess the tree. But her most recent actions reflect anything but a desire for objectivity,” said SDMGO spokesperson Michelle Peterson.


At a June 4 city council meeting, the mayor responded to pressure from citizens and council members and agreed to get a second assessment, after the city arborist’s first risk assessment was roundly criticized. Several weeks later, at the council meeting on July 16, between 1:01:00 to 1:05:25 in the recording, the mayor rebuffed requests by Councilmembers Kelly Von Holz and Joan Cathey to allow transparency during the interviews of the arborists applying to conduct the follow-up assessment.  


Von Holz and Cathey suggested that the mayor allow members of the Tumwater Tree Board and Tumwater Historical Commission to be on the interview panel. The mayor declined. Instead, the panel will consist solely of the mayor, City Administrator Lisa Parks, and City Attorney Karen Kirkpatrick.


“The documents we obtained through public records requests demonstrate that these three people, more than anyone else in the city, have been behind the flawed process threatening the oak tree for the past year,” SDMGO spokesperson Peterson said. “By barring anyone else from the interview room, they are continuing the same pattern of secrecy. It’s anti-democratic,” she said.  



Photos and videos by Melinda Wood of Olympia, July 10, 2024


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Court of Appeals Grants Temporary Stay to Tumwater Oak Group

Jul 5, 2024



For Immediate Release                                                                               July 3, 2024

 

Contact:

Ronda Larson Kramer, 360 259-3076, ronda@larsonlawpllc.com

 

Resources and links: http://linktr.ee.TumwaterOak

 

 

 

 

 

Washington State Court of Appeals Grants Temporary Stay to Tumwater Oak Group

OLYMPIA—The group standing between a historic 400-year-old Garry oak and the City of Tumwater’s plans to destroy the tree filed late July 2 in the Washington State Court of Appeals to stop action by the city until the group’s appeal is reviewed by the court.

This morning the court granted a Temporary Stay of the TRO Dissolution.


On May 31, Judge Anne Egeler of Thurston County Superior Court dissolved a temporary restraining order obtained by the group on May 24 from Judge Sharonda Amamilo of the same court.


The temporary stay, granted this morning, will be in effect pending the outcome of the July 2 request for injunctive relief to the appeals court from Save the Davis Meeker Oak. A response to the SMDGO motion from the City of Tumwater is due on July 15 and reply from SDMGO is due July 18, according to court order

.

The July 2 request to the appeals court aims to prevent any damage to the tree by the city, which has vowed to take it down and has resulted in a sustained public outcry and the formation last May of Save the Davis Meeker Garry Oak.


The appellate court has the authority to grant a stay when there are debatable issues and if there is a danger that the outcome of the appeal would become moot due to actions of one of the parties.


The motion asks the court to enjoin the mayor from cutting the tree pending the court’s final resolution of the appeal. No date has been set for that review.


The tree is historically, culturally and ecologically irreplaceable, according to the group. Through filed statements, SDMGO documents each of these factors.


The Tree Was and is Important to Native Americans


The declaration of Laura Young, a professional archivist from a sixth-generation Washington pioneer family whose children are enrolled members of an area Indigenous tribe, states that “This tree is known as one of the few territorial trees in the area used to hang Indigenous People as a method of forced property eviction before and during the regional Indian War of 1855-1856. After settlers arrived, vigilantes used it to hang Native Americans from one of its branches.”


Young added that there are also sensitive issues regarding Indigenous burial sites and grave desecration and theft of buried objects.


Young states “Not far from the tree was an intersection to an east-west trail called the Cowlitz to Yakama Trail, which went over the mountains to eastern Washington, and northwest to the Hood Canal area of the Twana and Skokomish Tribes, and the Quinault Nation. Shade next to a major trading route in the middle of a prairie where there was otherwise little shade would have been vitally important for travelers who needed to cool off and rest.”


This native oak is believed to be one of the very few still standing, noted Young. For it to be destroyed would be devastating to her family’s pioneer and Indigenous roots.

“It would prevent us from ever visiting our family’s living history again,” said Young.

An overlay map done by the Tacoma Historical Society of the 1854 survey and current aerial map shows the location of the tree in relation to the Cowlitz Trail. (Document titled Bush Family Farm).


A Pair of Kestrels is Nesting in the Tree


Raptor biologist Steve Layman documented the biological and environmental value of the oak in his declaration and the damage that removing the tree would cause to American kestrels protected by the international Migratory Bird Treaty Act.


“A family of kestrels will often reuse nest cavities year after year, down through the generations. Holes are in short supply. They evolved when there were all sorts of ages of trees, with holes mostly created by woodpeckers . . . ,” said Layman. “There are not very many trees with vacant holes anymore.”


Airport Expansion


Community activist Janet Witt’s declaration details the Port of Olympia’s planning documents that indicate the tree and the adjacent historic airplane hangar lie in the way of airport expansion. The expansion has been discussed for more than 20 years. However the port has not done an Environmental Impact Statement, only piecemeal assessments that do not address any impacts on the tree or hangar. The tree has been on Tumwater Register of Historic Places since the mid-1990s.


The City Relied on a Flawed Arborist’s Report


Beowulf Brower, a certified risk-assessment arborist, documented in his declaration the faulty information and process the City of Tumwater used to reach its flawed conclusion about the health of the tree and its decision to destroy the historic oak.



“It should, of all trees, have every conceivable thing done for it to avoid having to remove it,” said Brower. “The city arborist’s lack of consideration of any mitigation efforts other than full removal constitutes a breach in the expected duty of care assigned to a historic tree. By combining a scientifically-backed assessment, well-informed pruning and a simple cable system, any risk that exists can be mitigated to an acceptable level.”

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