WASHINGTON — It looks like there's a big victory now in a viral social media campaign to save an ancient tree in a Columbia Heights backyard.
Tree lovers had considered climbing into the huge pecan tree to save it from a condo developer's chain saws.
But after a stiff warning from D.C. officials, the developer now says rumors he was going to rip out the heritage tree are false.
"I love this tree!" said Nicole Thomas, looking up at it from her second-floor balcony next door.
The gnarled old giant has stretched its limbs at 1446 Fairmont Street through two world wars and just as many pandemics. "It's a historic part of this city. It's over 100 years old. It's been here longer than we have," Thomas said.
"I sit on our porch almost every morning and watch blue jays and squirrels and red-tailed hawks. All kinds of animals that use the tree as their home," Chris Berg, whose backyard is shaded by the tree, told WUSA9.
Columbia Heights has seen plenty of old trees removed to make way for gentrification. On Wednesday, neighbors say the developer building apartments in the vacant rowhouse next door told them the venerable pecan would have to go. "He said, 'We went back and forth with the city and we're just going to take it out,'" Berg said the developer told him.
City law protects trees as big as the pecan. It measures more than 118 inches in circumference. Trees over 100 inches are called heritage trees -- and the fine for removing them runs $30,000 and up.
"This developer is willing to take that illegal action and just pay the fine," said Caroline Wood, who started the last-ditch effort on Reddit to save the tree.
Fearing the worst, Wood left flowers at the base of her old friend and contemplated camping out in its trees to keep the chain saws away.
Butt in an emailed response to the neighbors' dread, developer Mikhail Phillips offered just a one-line response. "False have a good day," he wrote.
That's all he'd say.
The D.C. arborist works in the Transportation Department. Interim director Everett Lott said, "DDOT has had extensive dialogue with all parties involved with the heritage tree located at 1446 Fairmont Street NW. After multiple inspections, DDOT arborists determined the tree is not hazardous and informed that its removal would be breaking D.C. Code § 8-651.04a(c) and that the tree should be maintained.
If the law is violated, DDOT will issue a Notice of Infraction and can charge any or all parties involved in the tree removal.
"Assessed at $300 per inch of the circumference, the fine for the removal of this specific tree would equal $35,436. DDOT has offered to assist with devising a plan to help preserve the tree."
Neighbors hope they've sparked enough outrage so the pecan will shower their yards with splendor for many seasons to come.