This petition is up against the clock as the County may act against the trees at any time and your immediate action can make a huge difference.  Please help save the trees by signing the petition and ALSO sharing it via email and social media!!

PLEASE NOTE: When Change.org asks you to donate after signing the petition
 this money DOES NOT go toward our cause, it goes to the Change.org foundation !

The Department of Beaches and Harbors of the County of Los Angeles (‘DBH’) are renewing plans to destroy two of the most majestic 50 year old Coral trees (the official tree of Los Angeles), on Via Marina at Aubrey Austin Park and replace them with New Zealand Christmas tree saplings.  The Coral Tree can live up to 150 years.

The shade that these trees provide proportionally is far greater than the other trees. At least 35% of the park’s shade will be removed and the park will cease to be a park!

As you may know, in 2020, DURING nesting season, DBH attempted to cut down these HEALTHY coral trees in the Park, along with another, falsely claiming that they were in declining health. Our arborists proved them wrong and you all contributed to saving the trees. 

DBH gave us their assurances that they would preserve and protect the remaining trees, BUT THEY HAVE NOT KEPT THEIR PROMISE.

Now, just as we uncovered in 2020, Beaches and Harbors own arborists have yet again been producing discredited reporting with your taxpayer dollars which the County appears to be relying on to justify the continued destruction of our community’s remaining shade trees. 

From our qualified Master Arborist’s memo:

“Not only is the [DBH arborist’s] statement unsupported and nonsensical, it is dangerous because it removes the need for arborist judgment and tree preservation solutions, thus creating a precedent where any tree that is being root pruned for construction, sidewalk repair, or landscape projects could be removed.” 

We are asking for:

a) A temporary moratorium on any further destruction of Coral Trees at Aubrey Austin Park, Marina Del Rey, pending an independent survey of the subject trees. 

(Our qualified Master Arborist must be granted site access by DBH to conduct such a survey)

b) A full investigation into this matter to be reported back to the community as the reasons provided for the action by the County do not stand up to scrutiny.

TIME IS NOW OF THE ESSENCE as there is renewed County activity in the Park which appears to indicate preparations underway to resume destruction of these trees.