FOLEY, Ala. — Old Baldwin County was a place where a tree could make a name for itself. Take “Inspiration Oak,” for example. The Fish River giant’s girdling with a chainsaw 15 years ago prompted one county commissioner to call it “cold-blooded murder.”

Speculation concerning that particular live oak - its trunk had a 27-foot circumference - led some experts to conclude the tree was a sapling when Columbus came to America.

More recent American history is embodied in “Jackson’s Oak,” the live oak in Daphne, where Gen. Andrew Jackson addressed soldiers from one of its limbs following the massacre at Fort Mims during the War of 1812.

History now being made in Baldwin County, however, is bringing trees and forestland face to face with the county’s unprecedented growth and development. Trees in the Baldwin County of today typically don’t get names where development is concerned. Trees get cut.

Earlier this year, as residents of the Central Baldwin area met for a public hearing to discuss the proposed four-laning of Baldwin County Road 83 from the Foley Beach Express north to Interstate 10, oak trees that were planted a hundred years ago were cited by some residents as being eventual victims of the widening project. It was a sad realization for some residents, who gave voice to their feelings.

Canopy oaks that once lived on West Michigan Avenue in Foley had to be cut down some years back for drivers’ safety sake, that but one portent among many of things to come, namely, that Foley was on the way to becoming the fastest growing city in the state.

Last year, in the Magnolia Springs area, hundreds of oak trees appeared to be on the chopping block on dirt surfaced Beasley Road due to a residential subdivision that required road improvements to be approved.

Those trees were eventually spared but, according to residents in the same area, other trees have recently been cut in connection with the same subdivision.

Stanley Anderson of the Alabama Forestry Commission in Bay Minette calls what is taking place in Baldwin County between people and trees “wildland-urban interface.”

Anderson is urban interface coordinator for AFC in 34 south Alabama counties.

“We’re seeing a lot of development into what was forestland, especially north of I-10,” he said recently.

As a result of this trend, one of the concerns of foresters and natural resource professionals is the impact on “forest sustainability,” Anderson said.

Development is taking forestlands out of production. Forestlands are becoming “fragmented” with roads, powerlines, subdivisions and the like, he said.

When fragmentation takes place, the landscape becomes, in Anderson’s words, an “interface landscape,” and that leads to more human-wildlife incursions; to stormwater runoff and other water quality issues; and to decreases in water infiltration into the soil - “where we get our deep water,” Anderson said.

While Anderson thinks citizens are beginning to see something of the impact development is having on forestlands and natural resources, he believes that recognition is coming in a secondary fashion.

For example, a person might realize stormwater runoff is increasinly becoming an issue; that it doesn’t have to rain as much for flooding to take place. A person might become aware of the presence of more invasive species, such as popcorn trees and grasses such as cogongrass.

“As soil is disturbed these invasives come in and occupy the site,” Anderson said.

Likewise, residents of a subdivision might notice more deer around their homes than ever before. That, too, is the result of the interface landscape, he said, namely, development that occurs adjacent to forestland.

One huge issue AFC is facing in connection with this interface might sound more like the West Coast than the Deep South to some. That issue is firefighting.

“We’re spending more and more of our time and dollars protecting structures in interface than fighting fires,” Anderson said.

Thus, structural firefighters - like those in cities - are more and more having to team with wildland firefighters due to the interface of developments adjacent to what once was forestland.

“We lost 47 structures in 2007 across the state,” said Anderson of wildland fires.

As a result, Anderson said the state’s new forester, Linda Casey, has a concern about growth and development occurring in the wildland-urban interface.

“As more and more homes are built in the wildland-urban interface, the State Forester and Forest Commission want to emphasize protecting forests and homes from wildfire,” Anderson said.

For that reason, AFC is starting an educational program that is aimed at home and property owners, builders and developers, landscape architects and city planners.

“We’re going to talk about growth and development and how it affects forest sustainability and some of those other issues,” Anderson said.

One of the goals of “Firewise Alabama” will be educating everybody concerned on how to build a structure that will survive a fire without firefighter intervention, Anderson said.

Among the topics the program will address, according to Anderson, is the importance of infrastructure; how a development should be built with an eye to accomodating the fire service. Also, building homes out of materials that are fire-resistant will be taught, as will the importance of landscaping a home or development with less flammable plants and mulches.

“We’re complacent” in this area, Anderson said, that being because we live in an area where we get a lot of rain and we typically have a “lot of green.” But, “we live in an area where green burns, especially when it’s dry.”

TREES MAKE US

FEEL SECURE

Wendy Allen is one of the executive directors of Smart Coast in Fairhope. Smart Coast’s stated purpose is to promote “balanced development through greater citizen participation in Gulf Coast planning.”

Allen, a former Baldwin County commissioner and longtime environmentalist, says “sprawling development” is taking up much of the county’s green space.

“There needs to be a concerted effort to save trees as much as possible,” she said recently.

In her opinion, cutting down trees just makes it easier for development to occur, much like putting a development on farm or pasture land. She laughs at the idea that trees are a “renewable resource.” A tree, such as an oak, planted today will take years to mature, she said. Meanwhile, we’re creating “islands of heat” when mature trees are cut to make way for development or construction.

“Studies show trees actually make people feel more secure and connected to the community,” said Allen.

That emotional attachment to trees reaches beyond a landmark oak like the one that was “Inspiration Oak.” The hundreds of canopy oaks along Beasley Road in the Magnolia Springs area are a case in point. When those trees were threatened last year by road improvements in connection with a proposed 152-lot subdivision, some residents of the area said the live oak trees were one of the things that attracted them to the area. Paving the road at the expense of the trees wasn’t an option for them.

As it turned out then, improvements weren’t made to Beasley when the subdivision developer changed some of his plans. Those oaks were spared.

Yet, residents of that same area are today saying significant tree cutting has recently taken place in connection with the same subdivision, named, oddly enough, Meadow Wood.

Frank Leatherwood, an engineer with Volkert & Associates, said last year that the developer’s change in plans would be “less impactive” on trees. Contacted recently about tree-cutting that residents of the area say has been taking place recently in connection with Meadow Wood, Leatherwood said that has been by a private property owner clearing off what he called a “fencerow.”

“He cleared a section of property that he owns; it was not in conjunction with Meadow Wood,” said Leatherwood, who noted the county came out and checked on that.

Asked who that property owner is, Leatherwood said Dale Younce, a local businessman that Leatherwood identified in 2006 as being his point of contact with Silk Purse LLC, the developer of the proposed Meadow Wood subdivision.

Greg Smith, permit engineer for the Baldwin County Highway Department, said recently that Meadow Wood received conditional preliminary plat approval on July 6, 2006, subject to verification of non-jurisdictional wetlands on the development site and an issue concerning a paved road access.

The developer is trying to get documentation at present to get a full 60-foot right of way for the subdivision, Smith said.

Eddie Wolfe of the Alabama Department of Environmental Management said during a telephone interview on Nov. 7 that ADEM received complaints about burning at the site of the Younce property in October but no one from ADEM went to the site.

He received a secondary complaint on Nov. 1 from Dale Warriner, who lives on Norris Lane where her family has a farm. Wolfe said he went to the site after Warriner’s complaint but found the burning going on at that point met ADEM’s regulations.

“They indicated, by mistake, they had burned earlier,” said Wolfe of October burning at the site. ADEM didn’t fine them because, historically, the agency gets complaints of people burning in October when the burn ban is in effect, he said. The time frame often confuses people, he added.

Wolfe said using an accelerant to get a fire going is allowable but Younce wasn’t using anything illegal in this case to burn cut trees.

Warriner’s assessment of the incident is different from Wolfe’s.

“When the first complaint was filed, Eddie Wolfe didn’t come (to the site),” she said. That, in her opinion, helped speed up the process of cutting trees and burning them.

Richard Johnson, planning engineer for the Baldwin County Highway Department, said there were some “reasonably mature oaks” on the strip of land that Younce purchased and cleared in connection with meeting county requirements for Meadow Wood. Johnson said it would be irresponsible of him to estimate how many trees were cut.

Johnson was quick to point out that a private property owner “can push down trees … all he wants.” And Johnson said ADEM has determined that Younce “destabilized” less than an acre of land. To destabilize more than an acre of contiguous property requires, by ADEM’s standards, that the site be contained during the destabilization period, Johnson said.

Nevertheless, Johnson said the county has told Younce that he is currently “operating at (his) own risk;” that if the least thing is changed or modified in connection with plans already submitted to the county - “he’s married to the plan” - then the project will fall into the Magnolia Springs’ planning jurisdiction. Magnolia Springs has incorporated since the Meadow Wood project began.

And Magnolia Springs has a tree ordinance, said Johnson.

That tree ordinance includes designations for “Heritage Trees,” those being trees in excess of 24 inches in diameter; trees that can only be cut or harmed with the permission of the town’s planning commission. Species of trees cited in connection with heritage trees are live, red and laurel oak.

A developer is required to plant two trees for each heritage tree removed without permission. The town’s subdivision regulations also call for a tree density minimum of six native trees per acre.

MARKETABILITY

OF TREES

“I definitely think they are trying not to cut trees anymore,” said Leslie Lassitter, environmental manager for the city of Foley. Her reference is to developers who recognize the market value of a subdivision is higher with trees. Indeed, Lassitter said the presence of trees is evident in what she calls “high-end” subdivisions as opposed to those where trees are cleared away.

In Foley, however, the situation is a little different, she said. Foley’s concern is the amount of agricultural lands that are being converted to subdivisions. Thus, the city has had to put in tree planting requirements.

So, to what degree are developers talking about trees in their discussions with the city?

“It’s a growing thing where the developers are used to dealing with tree ordinances in larger cities, so when they come here to develop they ask if a tree survey is required, what are your requirements,” Lassitter said.

“It’s more the local developers that haven’t dealt with that as much unless they’ve been through Fairhope, which has a stringent tree ordinance.”

Lassiter calls Foley’s new tree ordinance a “start,” akin to Orange Beach’s and Magnolia Springs’, but not as stringent as Fairhope’s which she calls “very restrictive.”

One point the city’s comprehensive plan addresses is linking what Lassitter calls “forested areas” around subdivisions that would “create greenways” and, thus, make for “wildlife corridors.”

While she doesn’t deal with sewerage matters that much, she points out that it’s common knowledge with environmentalists that the advancement of waste water treatment plants causes urban sprawl.

“That’s why we have so many suddivisions that are remotely located, because the sewer companies are taking it (sewerage) to the people,” she said.

With that being the case, and with the potential for these remotely located subdivisions interfacing with forestland, how alert are developers to the potential for wildfires?

“In my knowledge I’ve never heard a developer express concern over building a subdivision next to a forested area due to fire concerns and wildfires. That’s just never been a point brought about,” she said.

Jamie Hinton, Foley fire chief, has that concern. As people in the county seek to live in interface areas - “secluded as can be,” he says - timber and brush can often hamper fire department access to houses, he said. Besides that, what with the volatility of wildfires and their capricious ways, timber and brush left uncleared could lead to firefighters getting trapped.

The high number of brush fires that FFD reports each month is indicative of the issue the county faces with wildland-urban interface. Hinton’s November report shows that of 101 total responses nine were for brush/grass fires as opposed to five structure fires and eight vehicle fires.

He also points to upper priced construction materials that aren’t making things any easier for fire departments. Take cedar shingles for example.

“They look beautiful on a house but they burn like a piece of hickory,” Hinton said.

While Alabama generally has higher humidity than wildfire states such as California, Hinton’s assessment of native plants agrees with that of Stanley Anderson with AFC: “A lot of our native plants burn like gasoline,” Hinton said.

STRANGE AS IT SEEMS

Anderson, in turn, agrees with Lassitter. He said developers are “waiting to be educated” on the importance of building structures with an eye to surviving fires, wildfires in particular. He’s hoping “Firewise Alabama” will make the various planning commissions in the county aware as well.

“They’re the ones who will have to change the ordinances to include the environment and fire protection,” he said of planning commissions.

Strange as it might seem, Anderson said the acres of forestland in the county have actually grown since 1990. In that year there were 662,000 acres of forestland, a figure he said includes all kinds of forestland but not agricultural lands. In 1999 that figure had climbed to 671,000 acres, and in 2006 to 719,000.

This increase in timberland has resulted in spite of the county’s considerable development and has come about by what Anderson calls tree planting initiatives and wildlife and environmental quality incentives. Yet, there is another aspect of this growth in timberland.

“As development occurs, there’s more opportunity for it to occur adjacent to forestland,” Anderson said.

And what about Baldwin County’s historic and beloved oak trees? Anderson said forest specialists don’t consider the live oak a “fire hazard tree.” Indeed, live oaks aren’t a dangerous fuel to the point that, unless it’s extremely dry, a live oak won’t burn even if you light a fire beneath it, said Anderson.