Can you talk about how your
urban forestry department
staff is organized?
Gina: In Portland, the Urban Forestry Division is
housed in the Parks and Recreation bureau. We
have three main workgroups under the Portland
City Forester; they are Operations; Regulations and
Permitting; and Science, Outreach, and Planting.
Portland's Urban Forestry Division has one of the
highest collective levels of certification of any in
the country. For instance, among our staff there
are 33 ISA Certified Arborists, 21 TRAQ arborists,
8 climbing specialists, 6 municipal specialists, 3
master arborists, and 2 utility arborist special-
ists. Portland employs 6 of only 55 ISA-Certified
Aerial Lift Specialists in the entire ISA program.
The Operations workgroup, comprised of one
supervisor, 15 full-time staff and 7 seasonal staff, is
responsible for managing trees in City rights-of-way
and in City parks. They perform tree work for capital
improvement projects as well as general maintenance
and tree planting on City-owned property. Operations
staff are the first responders to tree emergencies
affecting the public in City ROWs and in our parks.
All tree work is done in-house except in extreme
cases like after the "Snowpocalypse" event of 2017.
The Regulation and Permitting workgroup consists
of one supervisor, 12 tree inspectors who enforce
tree permitting of private property trees and of
public trees in development situations, and 5 tree
technicians who provide in-person permitting assis-
tance and serve as single point of contact for all
city tree concerns via phone and email. There are
also typically 2 seasonal assistants in this division.
The Science, Outreach, and Planting workgroup
consists of one supervisor, 6 full-time staff and
typically, 4-5 seasonal assistants. This workgroup
collaborates with the public and with partner
Portland
Quick Facts
• Human population of city: 650,000
• Street tree population: 218,000
• Park tree population: 26,000
• Urban forestry budget: 5.7 million dollars
• Number of urban forestry staff FTEs:
43 permanent full-time employees
and typically, 10-12 seasonals
groups to promote good urban forest stewardship.
They coordinate educational workshops, conduct
tree inventories and other canopy studies, orga-
nize tree giveaways, publish reports and outreach
materials, create informative online GIS maps, and
do policy work. With a focus on low income/low
canopy neighborhoods, they also plan and partner
with communities on tree planting projects.
Additionally, an 11-member volunteer Urban
Forestry Commission (UFC) consists of commu-
nity members appointed by the Mayor to advise
the City Forester, Parks Bureau Director, City
Commissioner, and City Budget Advisory Committee
on plans, policies, and projects that affect the
urban forest, including public appeals. >>
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