Trees will be coming down in Hollinger Park, but two of the oldest are being spared from the chainsaw.
At this week’s meeting, council voted to save two of the largest trees that were slated to come down at Hollinger Park. The item was added to the agenda by Timmins Mayor Steve Black.
In the past couple of weeks, there has been controversy on social media about cutting down trees in the popular park.
The debate started over the August long weekend and led to the city issuing a press release to clarify misinformation.
Since then, Black talked to staff to see if any of the trees in the area currently fenced in at the park could be saved.
“There’s really two big trees, which were the focal point of a lot of my discussions with community members over the last week in the fenced in area which were very old, very large trees which provide a lot of shade to that side of the park so I brought a resolution to council,” said Black after the meeting.
He said trees outside of the fenced-in area “will all be left standing and there’s the entire left side of the park where the playground structures are that isn’t fenced off right now and those trees will be staying as well.”
In his request to council, he said saving the trees would “at least give them the chance to survive, if they don’t we’d obviously have to remove them at a later date, there would be a cost toward that.”
In 2016, it was revealed that there are higher than normal levels of lead, arsenic and antimony in the surface soil at the park.
The remediation work includes improving the surfaces of the playground and splash pad, removing sand and brick to be compliant with the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act, and importing some fill to help with drainage in low-lying areas.
The city is also bringing in 12,000 cubic metres of fill for the north side of the park.
“The soil is contaminated and we have kind of held back since that report came, but I think that it’s important to say that if anyone, anyone, for whatever reason came to us and said that someone in their family had….caught something and they felt that it was from being in that part of the Hollinger Park, it could be extremely serious,” said Coun. Michael J.J. Doody.
“And I think we have had to deal with that and to make some tough decisions, but I think that we have to do what we have to do to deal with being on the side of being safety conscious and to make sure we protect ourselves and at the same time protect the people that are using the park.”
While saving one or two of the trees would be great, he said “we have to remember that we have been, in a way, forewarned that that soil is contaminated and we have to take those steps.”
Coun. Noella Rinaldo, however, said saving the trees is worth the gamble.
“It there’s any way that we can keep those two larger ones, I’m willing to take the risk of the cost involved,” she said.
Director of community and development services Marc Jensen noted staff are not proponents of cutting down the healthy trees, but said there are significant costs to saving the large trees.
“There are plans to plant a significant number of trees in the park, many more trees than what is there now. And the trees we’re proposing to plant aren’t going to be seedlings, they’re going to be eight to 12-foot trees,” he said.
