Do you need a permit?
No permit required for most private trees
Fort Wayne's tree permit stops at the curb. Section 99.146 makes it unlawful to trim, remove or plant a tree "within the limits of any public street, thoroughfare, lawn, park, parkway or boulevard" without written permission from the Board of Park Commissioners, and the city's own Urban Forest Management Plan reads that section as applying to work on trees "located in the right-of-way." A tree in your yard needs no permit and there is no size threshold anywhere in the code. The catch is that the right-of-way runs roughly eight feet in from the curb.
What's protected in Fort Wayne
- Street trees — any tree in the public right-of-way, which the city describes as "generally the area from the street side curb inward to a distance of approximately 8 feet"
- Park trees, in the city's 89 parks
- Trees on public thoroughfares, lawns, parkways and boulevards
- Trees on development sites during Development Plan or Site Plan Review — advisory only, not a permit
How to apply in Fort Wayne
- 1
This applies to a right-of-way or park tree only. First confirm which one you have — the Street Tree FAQ points residents to the Allen County GIS Data Viewer.
- 2
Call the Superintendent of Urban Forestry at 260-427-6480 and request the Street Tree Work Permit. The form is not on the city's online permits page, so calling is the practical route.
- 3
Complete it with the property address, owner and contractor contact details, work start and end dates, and the type of work — trim, tree removal, apply chemical, stump removal, sidewalk or driveway work, or planting.
- 4
City staff inspect before the work is approved. Permits are issued valid for one month, three months, six months or one year, and a post-work inspection follows.
Fees, penalties, and the ordinance
- Penalties
- Section 99.999(A): "Whoever violates any of the provisions of this chapter, for which no specific penalty is otherwise provided, shall, upon conviction thereof, pay a fine of not more than $2,500. Each day any violation of this code or of any ordinance shall continue shall constitute a separate offense."
- Ordinance
- Fort Wayne Code of Ordinances, Title IX, Chapter 99 — Streets and Sidewalks; Trees and Shrubs, Sections 99.140 through 99.148, penalty at Section 99.999. Authority flows from Fort Wayne Code 33.020 adopting IC 36-10-4-11. Zoning landscape standards are separate, at Section 157.408.
Worth knowing
- Fort Wayne does not remove private trees. Its roughly 50,000 street trees are surveyed each summer by ISA Certified Arborists, producing 500 to 600 removals a year scheduled by risk priority.
- Section 99.145 does reach into your yard, but as a duty rather than a permission: you must remove or trim any tree on your property that is unsightly, in a dangerous condition, or projecting over the street and obstructing passage or street lighting. Under 99.144 the city can do the work after ten days' notice, bill you, and lien the real estate.
- Chapter 100, the nuisance chapter, covers weeds and rank vegetation only. Trees are not listed there.
- You may prune your own street tree and the city encourages residents to stay involved, but Section 99.146 still requires written permission first.
- The Citizen Match Tree Planting Program cost-shares right-of-way trees in front of your house. Applications run February to July 1. The city is explicit that it "cannot plant trees... On private property. We can plant only public property."
- For a fallen street tree or limb, call 311 in Allen County, or 260-427-8311.
What we could not confirm
We would rather tell you what we don't know than guess. Call the office below to confirm these before you cut.
- — Whether any fee attaches to the Street Tree Work Permit. The form has no fee field and no tree fee appears in the city's permit listings, but the city does not state it is free either.
- — Whether the permit form published as an appendix to the 2014 Urban Forest Management Plan is still the current form, and whether the 1900 North Clinton address and 260-427-6400 number on it are still in use. The current Forestry page lists 705 E. State Blvd.
- — Whether Section 99.146 has an emergency or storm-damage exception. None is stated in the code.
- — No city page states affirmatively that a private tree needs no permit. The answer above rests on the ordinance limiting itself to public land, the city's own written interpretation of that section, and the absence of any private-tree provision in Chapter 99, Chapter 100, Chapter 150 or the zoning ordinance.