A group of residents of Cleveland’s Cudell neighborhood have recently protested the removal of green space and mature trees at Cudell Commons Park, on the city's west side, due to the construction of a new school in the area.
A handful of protesters held signs outside the Cleveland Metropolitan School District Board of Education meeting last week at East Professional Center and also spoke up during the public comment period, asking the school district to halt the removal of park space and trees. The district has planned for roughly a decade to demolish the current Marion C. Seltzer Elementary School, located south of Detroit Avenue on Cleveland’s West Side, and replace it with a new building as part of a property swap with the city of Cleveland.
Diana Sette, one of the protesters and a member of the Friends of Cudell Commons Park advocacy group, said although the project – which was set to begin with preliminary site work this month – would be costly to halt now, she said it’s worth it; officials have said redesigning the project at this point could cost upward of $1 million.
"Nature is shown to provide social-emotional learning and well-being, improving relationship and self-regulation skills, reducing stress and anger, and supporting youth coping with or recovering from adverse childhood experiences and trauma," Sette said. "Studies have also been found that an increased amount of vegetation in common spaces is related to an increased sense of neighborhood safety."
Ward 15 Councilmember Jenny Spencer also spoke up during the meeting, noting that the city’s tree preservation ordinance fell short in this situation.
“The city forester did not review plans for Seltzer until designs were final, providing little chance to preserve trees that the designers themselves did not seek to preserve,” she said. “I'm a member of the city of Cleveland's Urban Forestry Commission and we will be seeking to rectify this failure in our city's code.”
Spencer noted that plans to replace Seltzer have been in the works for a long time, with the city swapping land in the park with the school district roughly a decade ago. Still, she said community members' concern this late in the process is still understandable, considering some of the community engagement that happened on the project happened over the past few years when the pandemic still loomed large and community participation was lower.
The protesters argued that roughly 44% of the green space at Cudell Commons Park – along with 40 trees, including a few that some allege are 200 years old - would be removed in order to build the new school and parking lot, along with the city's plans to build new park amenities like a ballfield and multi-purpose recreation field.
Patti Choby, with Cobalt Group, Inc., a consultant for the project, disagreed, saying that 31 of 65 trees will be preserved through the project; of the remaining 34 trees, five are diseased ash trees and four are “weedy” nuisance mulberry trees; she also said none of the trees are 200 years old or more.
“And the tree protection plan has both directions for how to preserve the existing trees as well as what to do to make the existing trees more healthy,” she noted.
Officials also commissioned an analysis of if it could move one tree in particular, a large, mature Bald Cypress tree, but found that the tree would have little chance of survival if it were to be moved due to its extensive root system.
Brent Eysenbach - part of the Friends of Cudell Commons Park group - said in an email that he was concerned about the overall design of the project, which would sandwich green space and trees in between the new school and the Cudell Recreation Center.
“The very large school building will cast a confusing and uninviting shadow on the sliver of park space that will remain between the school and the rec center,” he said. “Will people feel comfortable recreating on ‘the front lawn’ of a school that is in session, adjacent to a playground nonetheless?”
Board of Education Vice President Leah Hudnall said the board shared the residents’ concerns about preserving green space, but also questioned Spencer – whose ward Cudell is in – on what Council is doing as a whole to address these issues across the city.
“Are you working with your colleagues in any way to address diseased trees or anything like that that we can be aware of with all of your colleagues across council?” she said.
Spencer responded that the Urban Forestry Commission had fallen dormant for some time and that it is setting up its “work plan” for the future and noted funding is going to be a challenge for the commission. Still, she said closer coordination between the city and CMSD will help preserve “legacy trees” across the city.
The construction project for the new school building was scheduled to get under way this month, but it's now unclear when that project, or the removal of trees for the new building, will occur. CMSD communications officials referred questions to Choby, who has not responded to a request for comment since Friday afternoon.
