As Miami weighs changes to its tree protection laws, an FIU analysis finds that city rules meant to mitigate tree removal are inadequate, leaving the city well behind its promise of 30% canopy coverage.
In 2007, after a run of hurricanes, the City of Miami joined other local municipalities by signing on to an ambitious goal: roughly doubling total citywide tree canopy to 30 percent by 2020.
The announcement, made with much fanfare by then-Mayor Manny Diaz, came with a comprehensive blueprint of strategies and initiatives — the Miami Tree Master Plan – to get there.
Five years after the deadline, the city is nowhere near its goal, and may even be back where it started.
That’s the conclusion of Florida International University (FIU) environmental scientist Chris Baraloto, who has developed computer modeling to track both the short- and long-term impacts of tree removal.
Baraloto, associate director of FIU’s International Center for Tropical Botany, announced his findings last Friday from his offices adjacent to the Kampong National Tropical Botanical Garden in South Grove.
“Many of us are feeling development and the loss of canopy,” Baraloto said. “I know there’s probably not a lot of political will to characterize that loss right now, but we need to understand what we’re dealing with if we want to get to the how.”
Indeed, the city does not measure its own urban tree canopy (UTC). The last comprehensive survey was conducted by Miami-Dade County in 2020. While Coconut Grove proved a bright spot, boasting 39% UTC, citywide Miami hovered around 17 percent.
Since then, Baraloto suspects the city’s total canopy may have slipped closer to 15%, with Coconut Grove – a development hot spot – among the biggest losers.
“I think that everyone needs to wrap their heads around the urgency of this issue, and that the status quo is not good enough for us to make progress,” Baralato said.
Baraloto says he hopes the city’s 30% canopy goal remains front and center as officials weigh sweeping changes to Miami’s tree laws. Advocates, including District 2 Commissioner Damian Pardo, argue that the existing code places costly and unfair burdens on average homeowners.
But civic and environmental groups see the proposed revisions as a Trojan horse for allowing widespread tree removal by development interests.
Even under Miami’s existing tree ordinance, Baraloto argues, tree canopy will continue to shrink due to the gross inadequacies of the city’s mitigation requirements for legal, permitted tree removal.
To demonstrate this, he pointed to Elemi at Grove Village, a 46-unit residential complex opened in 2024 on Thomas Avenue in West Grove.
City officials authorized the removal of 61 trees, some decades old, and mandated that 98 new ones be planted – either onsite or elsewhere in the city through a contribution to the city’s Tree Trust Fund.
A fair trade off? Not at all, according to Baraloto.
According to his modeling, in 20 years the new trees will only measure 9% of the canopy “crown” area, and 16% of the basal area (diameter of the trunk) of the trees that were removed.
“[The developers] really think they’re doing a green thing there, and they did much more than was called for by law. But still it’s not the same thing,” Baraloto said.
The problem, he said, for example, is that 20 two-inch-diameter trees do not offer the same environmental benefits as one 60-inch-diameter tree. And yet that’s the way Miami’s rules are written.
“It’s not representative of the true benefits that we’ve calculated,” Baraloto said. “I don’t think that’s something the public, at least the public with which I’ve spoken, understands enough.”
Benefits like carbon storage are measured on a cubic scale, meaning they increase dramatically in large, old-growth trees, as compared to several small ones.
“It doesn’t just regrow overnight,” said Sandy Moise, director of policy at the Miami-based Urban Paradise Guild and a founding member of Miami’s Trees Matter Most. “You can’t put in 10 trees and think you’re going to get the equivalent canopy, because you’re not.”
The ordinance operates on the assumption that newly planted trees will replace – in size and stature – what was removed. But that’s a big assumption, and one that could take several decades under optimal growing conditions.
In the meantime, critical ecological benefits that trees provide to the city — stormwater mitigation, carbon sequestration, and biodiversity — are put on hold.
And such benefits matter greatly to Miami residents, according to the results of a new survey launched by FIU in partnership with several non-profits and activist groups.
The survey’s 500 responses, to date, show strong support for clarifying and strengthening the city’s existing ordinance, as well as for committing to a canopy survey every five years. Respondents also recognized the many benefits trees provide — from mental health to property values, Baraloto said.
The city’s efforts to revise its tree ordinance have come to a standstill.
In April, after intense lobbying by civic and environmental groups, Miami District 1 Commissioner Miguel Gabela withdrew a controversial re-write of the city’s tree laws. Weeks later, commissioners requested from the City Manager’s Office a thorough assessment of tree and environmental regulations, but later canceled the request.
In late July, the commission approved a $180,000 contract with the Florida State University Consensus Center to lead a public engagement process on the city’s tree ordinance and the creation of a citizens board to weigh in on restructuring the ordinance.
Moise, who was tapped to be a possible member of this board, said the process appears stalled. In her last update, last month, city officials said the committee was still being assembled.
“It’s surprising they promised all of this and nothing has happened,” Moise said. “It was also disappointing that the city would put so much money into hiring a consensus-building group, instead of just working with the groups that we have locally who could do the work without charging such an exorbitant fee,” she said.
The City of Miami officials could not be reached for comment.
