Commissioner Feltner stated there is a neighborhood in Hammock Trace, it is a lovely
neighborhood; if one were to take Spyglass all the way to where it intersect Murrell and go
across, hang a right, one would be in Hammock Trace; he has friends in there and was in there
last week; he spoke with Mr. French on Good Friday; he met with a couple of the neighbors and
walk around the sidewalks; the short of it is, and they do have majestic and beautiful Oak trees
that are 30 years old, as he thinks the neighborhood is about 30 years old, the trees are
between the sidewalk and the street, so there is that thin strip of grass and that is where they
placed the trees; conversely in his neighborhood, they put two live Oaks in all of their front
yards; he had to remove his because it buckled the driveway, caused other problems after the
04 hurricanes, and all those sort of things; and anyone who has the Oak trees has to deal with
them, but they are beautiful trees, no debating that fact. He continued by saying the situation is
that the County does take care of the sidewalks, they are not behind a gate; there are now
sidewalks that are raised up, therefore, there are American Disabilities Act (ADA) concerns with
that; now, they can grind some tops of the sidewalks, but there are definitely some areas that
are going to have to be addressed; he went out there and walked with one neighbor and there
are five inches, so that is not shaving the top of the sidewalk; and he talked with Mr. Bernath,
just so everyone understands, nothing is moving forward today, everyone is on pause until it
can be figured out. He noted the County does not want to go out there and cut all the trees
down; he would suggest to everyone that it is a lot cheaper fi the County did not have to do
that; the County is going to find a good way to do it; there will definitely have to be some root
trimming to deal with the sidewalks; he has heard this term where the sidewalk can be lifted,
trim the root, put the sidewalk down, but he does not think the County quite thinks it happens
like that; he thinks it needs to be repoured; there are places in Suntree, since he has been a
Commissioner, where they have had to repour individual segments; when he first got here
Interlocking was finishing up that ditch work and several pieces of the sidewalk individually
were broken because heavy equipment were driving across doing the ditch work; that went on
for a while; and he will say the contractor that County had at that time, did a very good job of
getting out there pretty quick and doing it; and they want to be very respectful, and make sure
they do it right. He went on to say he thinks his office is trying to plan a meeting with the
residents here, and they are the contacts for that; that will be done before the County moves
forward with any plans; and that is where they are today.
Chair Altman stated he was a longtime resident of Viera; in this case, Viera had experienced it
as well; they have a beautiful Oak tree in the middle of their yard, was between the house and
the sidewalk; he did not realizes they were between the sidewalk and the road, which
complicates factors; it is the same thing, sidewalk is lifted; it is amazing what the Oaks in this
part of Florida will do to raise sidewalks, probably because of the high water table; he has lived
this issue and still lives it as a property owner in Viera; he is a part of the community and
appreciates what Commissioner Feltner does there; and he has a couple of questions about
this. He went on to say this is a huge issue, and of course everyone knows about the tree battle
on Rockledge Drive, it was legendary, and still is; this is an issue that will not go away and
ultimately affect all Districts; one of the things that comes to his mind and he thought this,
maybe the Board needs to look at the Subdivision Codes, Site Plan approval codes, that
whenever a sidewalk is put it that it is put in properly; included in that, may be the need to put in
what is called tree wells, a thickened footer on the edge of the sidewalk between where any
tree would be planted to help create a wall to prevent those roots from going right under the
sidewalk and lift it up; that is just a thought; and maybe when the Board looks at the Code, it
might want to evaluate that from this point going forward. He continued by saying his second
question is and he would assume the County would bear the cost of doing all of those repairs,
and he asked what would be the revenue source, an Municipal Services Taxing Unit (MSTU)
tax that would benefit the local residents; he commented that maybe the County should apply a
certain percentage of the MSTU to fixing these problems; and also, he would love to see a poll
from the neighborhood of how many want to keep the trees and how many want to take them
