Protecting Pohutukawa on private land

Ōpōtiki District Council has issued a reminder to landowners who have Pohutukawa on their property that council needs to be involved in any decisions before trees are maintained or pruned.

Council’s Planning and Regulatory Group Manager, Gerard McCormack, said that the District Plan was clear on the issue and while most people wanted to do the right thing, it was important to involve the council before any work was done.

“I know that most people want to do the right thing and they are taking the right steps to look after the Pohutukawa and keep them healthy and safe.

“The District Plan says that if you have pohutukawa trees on your property, you are allowed to prune them to keep them healthy or for safety reasons, for example, if branches are dangerous or risk falling on your house. But you have to do two things first – you must get a suitably qualified person (an arborist) to explain what needs to happen and how. And you must lodge that explanation with council BEFORE work gets underway. If you can’t do that, you have to get resource consent, which is a much lengthier process.

“We have had a couple of instances recently where people have got the right advice and done the work for the right reasons, but council wasn’t aware of it before works started. That means we are fielding calls and concerns and the process is lengthy and resource consent needs to be sought retrospectively. Basically, you can save a lot of heartache and trouble if you talk to council first,” Mr McCormack said.

Mr McCormack clarified that this process only applied to Pohutukawa on private land. Trees of any kind on public land were the responsibility of the landowner, usually council or the Department of Conservation, regional council, or Waka Kotahi. Any damage to those trees without first talking to the landowner was illegal and may be prosecuted.

“It is always best to talk to council first, particularly if it is a native tree or a notable tree of any kind,” Mr McCormack said.