Sonoma State University will remove 50-year-old eucalyptus trees

Piper Rosier has taken many a walk under the shade of 50-year-old eucalyptus trees standing between Sonoma State University student housing and the shoulder of East Cotati Avenue.

“It’s always a treat to walk among them,” the German cultural studies major said.

The grand but disheveled eucalyptus trees flanking the Rohnert Park campus along stretches of East Cotati Avenue and Petaluma Hill Road have been a well-established presence since the 1970s. But their tendency to shed bark and debris over the roadway and concern about their combustibility have marked them as a fire hazard to university administration.

Their time on campus is now officially winding down. The first of about 205 trees are scheduled to be cut down starting Monday, the university announced this week in an email to staff and students.

SSU spokesman Robert Eyler said the decision to remove the eucalyptus is grounded in an effort to reduce hazardous fuels for wildfire and reintroduce native vegetation to the areas occupied by the Australian-native giants for the past 50 years.

“These trees provide a lot of flammable leaf litter,” Eyler said. “(There’s) more risk in terms of having fuel that close to the road.”

But not all campus community members, including Rosier, are convinced that felling the eucalyptus is the best option.

“They are not particularly bad,” Rosier said. “It is an act of destruction, so it hurts.”

With a contract signed with Atlas Tree and Landscape to clear trees through Sept. 30 and a deadline to use nearly $300,000 in federal grant funding, there’s little possibility the eucalyptus will avoid their fate.

Eyler said the university’s focus on removing hazardous fuels from campus has only been honed in recent years by the recurrence of destructive wildfires in the North Bay. Part of the motivation to dial down the risk, he said, includes being a good neighbor.

“The city of Rohnert Park is really happy this is happening,” he said.

Don Schwartz, Rohnert Park’s assistant city manager, concurred.

“I don’t know that anybody likes to see trees come down,” he said. “But we appreciate them mitigating the risks and the university doing their part.”

An online petition circulating on Change.org advocating to keep the trees, however, argues that the eucalyptus would not significantly impact fire danger if they were allowed to stay.

“These trees provide shade, character, and a bit of a sound barrier for the campus residential areas,” reads the petition, which as of Friday evening had been signed by more than 200 people (Sonoma State’s unofficial enrollment this fall is about 7,474 students). “Following through with the decision to remove them will have irreversible effects, ones that will tarnish the beauty for which our campus is loved.”

Rosier pointed to divided scientific consensus about the flammability of eucalyptus and its invasive potential as a nonnative species, a debate highlighted in a 2016 article in The Atlantic magazine. The piece, which explored the split attitudes toward eucalyptus in the San Francisco Bay Area, called the tree “a prisoner of dueling realities.”

The Federal Emergency Management Agency will cover 75% of the cost of the project, according to a letter from the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services. That award, provided through FEMA’s Hazard Mitigation Grant Program, was $297,984. The university put up the remaining $99,328.

SSU needs several months, at least, to determine the plan and associated costs for landscaping or planting native vegetation after this project’s completion, Eyler said.

The plan to remove the trees wasn’t confirmed until the grant money came through in April, he said. By that time, the COVID-19 pandemic and resulting recession began to influence Sonoma State University’s financial decisions.

For now, the destruction of the eucalyptus remains the only definite part of the plan in place. The university told staff and students that the trees will be chipped after they are cut.

Rosier said the loss of the trees makes her sad. Her mother, who attended Sonoma State University in 1978 and 1979, and again in 2012, also walked in their shade during her time as a student. She has her doubts about whether new landscaping will provide the same respite.

“That just will not have the life and vibrant beauty and dynamism of those trees,” she said.

You can reach Staff Writer Kaylee Tornay at 707-521-5250 or kaylee.tornay@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @ka_tornay.