Recap of August 5, 2026 Joint Township Meeting on Tree Ordinances
- Aug 6
- 4 min read
Last night, members of the Township Committee, Open Space, Land Use Board, Environmental Commission, and Ag Advisory Committee came together in a workshop to talk about potential tree cutting ordinances. The full video of the meeting is available below.
To set the context of the meeting, recently the New Jersey State Department of Environmental Protection (NJDEP) mandated that municipalities enact some sort of ordinance protecting trees. Along those lines, NJDEP has created "model ordinances" that Townships can either use directly, or can be used as a basis for ordinances. A baseline concern that DEP has in relation to tree cutting is storm water management, and how aggressive tree cutting can have negative consequences for communities in the form of increased storm water runoff, flooding, sedimentation of streams, and similar issues.
Right off the bat there was a great deal of controversy over the NJDEP side of this, and what in particular NJDEP is mandating vs. what may be considered optional in those model ordinances. Some people at the meeting wanted to follow the NJDEP ordinances directly, others felt that the DEP regulations were closer to suggestions, and it was up to the Township to ultimately decide how the ordinances should be worded.
The bulk of the meeting discussed three potential versions of the ordinance(s). It was not entirely clear how these three distinct variations were arrived at, and unfortunately copies of the variations ran out before we could get our hands on one.
The conversation really came down to a few things:
Several people noted that West Amwell has somewhat unique geography, geology and topography, and that any ordinance should take our uniqueness into account. We should not model an ordinance on a place like Lambertville or in radically different areas like southern NJ.
It was noted that West Amwell has extensive forests and trees and many property owners have substantial collections of trees on their properties. We are very rural and agriculturally-forward.
A balancing needs to done between the rights of property owners, a general desire to stay out of people's business when possible, and the broader community's rights when it comes to things like storm water management.
There was a great deal of back and forth on the definitions of "forests" and "forest management" vs. regular property owners in more suburban settings like Music Mountain or The Hills vs. many property owners in between.
Of course 25 Hewitt Road came up repeatedly as a worst-case example of what can happen when no storm water management rules are followed at all in a Township like ours
The meeting was surprisingly cordial and wide-ranging, with many members of the public speaking as well as the various Committee members. Mike Pisauro, Policy Director at The Watershed Institute (https://thewatershed.org), was there as well offering up his perspective.
The room was fairly strongly divided into a few camps:
Large property owners. Folks with large properties involving many trees. These folks are concerned about nuisance laws impacting them, the potential costs of some of the ordinance variations, and potential peverse incentives some of the these laws might create. In particular, overly aggressive tree felling ordinances might discourage residents from planting new trees.
People concerned with storm water impacts. Several Hewitt Road residents were there (myself included), and we were all interested in approaches that would give the Township more teeth when confronted with controversial development projects that impact other residents or the entire community.
Small property owners. Several people were advocating for small property owners and reducing or eliminating the potential financial burden on them, and as with the large-property owner use cases, not accidentally installing peverse incentives for people to avoid planting new trees, or even leaving dead trees standing to avoid tree cutting fines or permit costs.
At the end of the 2 1/2 hour meeting, it was not entirely clear what the outcome was. The focus appears to have been on drafting a minimal ordinance that would get the NJDEP off the Township's back while not burdening residents with complicated or unfair tree felling laws.
There will be more work here and I'm sure we will be coming back to this topic as the ordinance drafts evolve.
I'll be frank and say I was hoping this meeting might address the 25 Hewitt Road issue more directly. The conversation about forests vs. non-forests and tree management plans and the rest was all fairly confusing, and largely side stepped the 25 Hewitt kind of concerns entirely. The folks I know on Hewitt Road were not happy with the direction the meeting went in. I hope the Township does not forget what is happening at 25 Hewitt, and that eventually we can have ordinances that give the Township tools against what I'll categorize as hostile development. It is impossible to convey the frustration of dealing with all the flooding and silt and property damage and plain old disfigurement of our community, to have the Township government whole-heartedly agree with how bad it is, and then have them shrug that there are no legal remedies they can help with.
However you feel about it, you should tell the Township. If you have an opinion on this matter, I urge you to write the township committee care of the Township clerk at clerk@westamwelltwp.org. Whether you want to advocate for stronger protections against impacts such as 25 Hewitt; you're concerned of the Township getting up in your business and counting your trees; or you generally want stronger, weaker, or no change tree protections, write and let them know.
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