Chichester Tree Wardens reconfirmed our Strategy at our meeting held on 18th August 2023, as set out below. Pleasingly, several items previously included under the heading "what we would like to do" are now in progress.

1. Familiarise ourselves with the trees in the areas we cover and where we get out and about, finding out who owns/manages them, keeping an eye on their health and anticipating/reporting any problems.

Ongoing - there are always things to learn!

2. Learn about risks to trees including particular conditions and diseases (e.g. ash die-back) and impacts of adverse weather; anticipate/understand conflicts (e.g. leaves/needles in gutters, damage to garden walls).

Ongoing.

Please see the Tree Health and Biosecurity topic in our Reference section.

3. Look for opportunities to improve the local environment by planting appropriate trees in appropriate locations and encouraging replacement planting where trees have been lost. Such planting should follow best practice (e.g. time of year, stakes and ties, mulch, watering provision) and be accompanied by early-years aftercare (particularly watering).

Ongoing.

Our Mind the Gap project was paused in 2023, although we continue to encourage and support volunteers to water young trees. (See also 8 below.)

4. Engage with the planning system (including policy) and other policies insofar as they have implications for trees

a)     Try to be aware of development proposals and consider their impact on trees, and the impact trees have on both people and place (including wildlife); respond constructively to planning applications

b)    Contribute to the formulation/evolution of CDC planning policy in relation to trees and the environment (the obvious opportunity being via the Local Plan Review process) and to other important policies where trees have a part to play e.g. air quality, biodiversity

Ongoing.

We are unable to look at every planning application in the Chichester City parish area; you can help by being alert to planning applications in areas you know and considering how they affect trees/if enough trees are included.
Find both current and determined planning applications here.
In addition, some planning applications (relating to:

• infrastructure and waste - for example, recycling and other waste processing sites, and sewage treatment plants
• minerals - for example, quarries and oil/gas sites
• the County Council's own development, known as Regulation 3 - for example, schools, libraries and fire stations)

are dealt with by West Sussex County Council.

Our representations made to Chichester District Council in response to its Proposed Submission (Regulation 19) consultation for the new Draft Local Plan are now available to view online (Respondent ID no. 8014). A key strand of our response is that a Trees and Woodland Strategy should be prepared, subjected to public consultation, and adopted as a Supplementary Planning Document. This would make it a material planning consideration, so as to enable delivery of the net gain in tree cover forming part of Strategic Objective 2 and ensure that the spatial distribution of that net gain reflects the aspirations of the Plan as a whole.

5. Outreach:

a)     Communicate with local people interested in trees and respond to queries about trees, trying to find ways that trees and people can support each other and sign-posting relevant information/contacts (we are not qualified to give advice)

b)    Raise the profile of trees in the city, and improve understanding, including organising/taking part in tree talks, tree awareness events, tree trails and encouraging civic pride* in our tree heritage (and sponsorship of trees, if appropriate)

c)     Attend and/or run events to learn about trees (including tree trails as part of the Festival of Chichester (see also 6. Training)

Ongoing.

This website, created August 2020, is part of our efforts towards this objective, including new email address and building our contacts, so that we will be able to issue an e-newsletter in due course.
Our Facebook group offers a place to "chat" about trees, if you use Facebook. Since April 2022, you can also find us on X (formerly known as Twitter) @ChiTrees.

We network in person through various groups, including Eco Chi and local Residents' Associations.

If you would like one (or more) of us to come to your organisation, or an event you are planning, to talk about trees/help in some way, please ask.

6. Participate in organised training for Tree Wardens to improve our knowledge and skills

Ongoing - there are always things to learn!

Limited local training available (last from the West Sussex Tree Warden Network was March 2020 in Pulborough on biosecurity). A South East Tree Warden Forum is organised annually by the Tree Council.

The Arboricultural Association organises very good free-to-attend webinars, some of which are available to watch on catch-up, at least for a limited time.

New training materials were published by the Tree Council in autumn 2021. All TWs are expected to undertake a basic refresher on the TW Scheme and encouraged to explore the other training modules. Induction module is essential.

The Tree Council issues regular informative emails to volunteer Tree Wardens, including the Tree Talk series published on SubStack.

7. Project: ChiTrees

We aimed to “Initiate/help create a comprehensive inventory of Chichester trees, an AUDIT of what we have and where, so we all understand Chichester’s existing tree heritage/“asset base” and its economic value”.

Our ChiTrees project is taking this aspiration forward as best we can.

Ongoing.

Please see ChiTrees pages in our Our Projects section.

Chichester City Council commissioned a Green Spaces Study as part of its preparations to inform drafting of a Neighbourhood Plan. The October 2020 report can be downloaded from its Neighbourhood Plan Document Archive.

Our target was in part inspired by the following example:

Petersfield’s Trees – their importance and value.

Results of the i-Tree Eco Survey.

Report to East Hampshire District Council, the South Downs National Park Authority and Petersfield Town Council. The Petersfield Society, Petersfield

Moffat, A.J., Doick, K.J. and Hendley, P. (2017)

ISBN 978-0-9931901-1-7

The full report may be downloaded from here. (The Project website, to inform and engage with volunteers and other interested people during the project, is no longer available.)

Petersfield chose to use i-Tree (please see the Urban Forest topic in our Reference section) to inform the collection and analysis of its audit data. (Wrexham County Borough pioneered the i-Tree system for its own audit in 2013.)

8. Project: Mind the Gap

Mind the Gap fundraising took place in 2020, 2021 and 2022 for additional street trees (75+) working with Orchard Street/Avenue, Parklands and Whyke communities. Chichester Tree Wardens also worked with Residents’ Associations in East Broyle and Summersdale to plant more trees.

Although this project is not continuing to fundraise for new street trees, we continue to encourage and recruit volunteer waterers. (See also the Tree Council's Trees Love Care campaign during March through September as featured in our Forthcoming Events section.)

9. Project: a Tree Strategy for Chichester



Encourage the creation of a TREE STRATEGY for Chichester, in partnership with civic authorities and major landowners and based on the audit and understanding the implications of a “do nothing” approach.

Context has changed considerably since this was first set as a target in 2018, with both national and local policy increasingly recognising the importance of trees, including in relation to the impacts of climate change and pollution. See the Tree Policy topic in our Reference section.

• England Trees Action Plan 2021-2024 (published May 2021)
• West Sussex County Council high-level strategy West Sussex Tree Plan (published December 2020)
• Chichester District Council still has no Tree Strategy, although it declared a Climate Emergency in July 2019 and tree planting/encouragement is included in its Action Plan. It is also 3 years in to a now 5-year DEFRA tree planting pilot project.
• Local tree and woodland strategy toolkit (TAWS) published December 2022 by the Tree Council with DEFRA and the Forestry Commission “provides step-by-step guidance for local authorities to develop an effective trees and woodland strategy to realise the multiple benefits trees can deliver to their communities.”

We have referenced TAWS in our representations to CDC on its latest draft Local Plan as a way to achieve its objectives (see 4 above).

Plans to help Chichester City Council deliver a Chichester Tree Summit in April 2020 had to be postponed as a consequence of covid-19. With other commitments, an appropriate time to reschedule this has not yet arrived.

Target:
Recruit new Tree Wardens (so someone has an eye out for trees in the whole of Chichester parish; and we improve the capacity and resilience of what we can achieve together).

More action required.