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VI. Policy Recommendations
When formulating tree law and policy, lawmakers must balance public,
social, and environmental interests against private property rights.
156
Effective tree laws must therefore respond to the normative conflicts
inherent within these divergent interests. The development of urban forests
requires the full participation of citizens and local governments, where
control of urban forests is focused at the local level.
157
The best framework for resolving these normative conflicts is to utilize
adaptive co-management strategies. Under this framework, policies for tree
management are formulated by local communities (rather than state
agencies), where policy makers continually reevaluate strategies according
to the latest scientific knowledge and the needs of communities.
Lawmakers should
favor policies that facilitate the development of sustainable urban forests
and laws should encourage private citizens to participate in the active
management of both public and privately owned trees.
158
Local
communities should have flexibility to develop tree laws that respond to the
unique needs of their community, as well as unique ecological challenges
that may not exist on a statewide level. In some respects, the many varied
local tree ordinances in California represent an adaptive co-management
system that is already in place.
159
156. See, e.g., Keith H. Hirokawa, Sustainability and the Urban Forest, 51 NAT. RES. J.
233, 236 (2011) (“Urban forestry requires an investigation into the ties between the
community’s environmental, economic, and social needs.”).
San Francisco and Los Angeles, for
example, have responded to the individual needs of their communities in
unique ways by instituting urban forest management plans that respond to
157. Janet A. Choi, Note, Cultivating Urban Forests Policies in Developing Countries, 11
S
USTAINABLE DEV. L. & POL’Y, 39, 39–40 (2010); cf. Edward J. Sullivan & Alexia Solomou,
“Preserving Forest Land for Forest Uses” – Land Use Policies for Oregon Forest Lands, 26 J. E
NVTL.
L. & LITIG. 179, 246–47 (2011) (arguing that the best way to manage forest resources is
through state agencies, rather than local land use regulation).
158. Jonathan Liljeblad, Adaptive Co-Management Thresholds: Understanding Protected
Areas Policy as Normative Conflict, 19 H
ASTINGS W.-NW. J. ENVTL. L. & POL’Y 231, 236 (2013)
(noting that vesting decision-making power in local communities “will alleviate
conflicts between the natural ecosystem and human interests”); see also Fikret Berkes,
Devolution of Environment and Resources Governance: Trends and Future, 37 E
NVTL.
CONSERVATION 489, 489–90 (2010); Lisen Schultz, et al., Participation, Adaptive Co-
Management, and Management Performance in the World Network of Biosphere Reserves, 39
W
ORLD DEV. 662, 662–63 (2010); cf. Kai Chan et al., When Agendas Collide: Human Welfare
and Biological Conservation, 21 C
ONSERVATION BIOLOGY 59, 60 (2007) (criticizing the
strategy of vesting decision-making power in local communities).
159. See supra Parts II.C, IV.