TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — Cutting down a whole lot of trees could get someone in a whole lot of trouble. The City of Tucson is investigating to learn how most of the trees in a small park ended up cut down.
In Arizona we appreciate shade so we love any trees we can get so you can imagine people are pretty upset about a mass cutdown that happened in Navajo Wash Park.
This park used to be green---almost a forest— until someone sawed most of its trees down to stumps.
“It's really unfortunate. It's a sad, sad situation.”
Katie Gannon is director of Tucson Clean and Beautiful. Part of living up to that name includes working to get more trees going up around Tucson. But here, she says 74 trees went down.
Gannon says fifteen years ago neighborhood volunteers won a city grant to fill the park with trees. They planted those trees and carefully hand watered them for the many months required to get a tree established.
We could not confirm exactly who ordered the trees cut down. KGUN9 tried to contact all five board members of the nearby Hedrick Acres Neighborhood Association. We got no response by airtime.
Two of those members are part of a lawsuit suing the city of Tucson. It claims the city failed to control homeless people in the neighborhood, particularly in Navajo Wash Park. and that violence, drug use and filth are common in the area.
There is no proven direct connection between the lawsuit filing the lawsuit and cutting the trees.
But there’s another type of law in this story: criminal law.
Gannon says, “You can't go destroy a public space just because you feel like it. That shouldn't happen.”
Trees planted in city land become city property.
The Tucson City Attorney’s office confirms there is an investigation going on but won’t say any more. Katie Gannon says police detectives asked her about the case.
Gannon would like to see something like restitution to help pay for restoring the park but she says it could easily take 15 years to return the park to anything like what it was before the chain saws fired up.
“There needs to be justice. Our system holds people accountable. I hope that they do in this case.”
RELATED: Unauthorized removal of 50+ trees in Navajo Wash
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Craig Smith is a reporter for KGUN 9. With more than 40 years of reporting in cities like Tampa, Houston and Austin, Craig has covered more than 40 Space Shuttle launches and covered historic hurricanes like Katrina, Ivan, Andrew and Hugo. Share your story ideas and important issues with Craig by emailing craig.smith@kgun9.com or by connecting on Facebook and Twitter.
