Driving along Duncan Plains Road northwest of Rt. 62, it’s hard to miss two large maple trees set close to the road.
They have stood sentinel there for 50 or more years in the front yard of Debra and Eric Scholtens’ home, and the trees have shaded their century-old house and shielded the couple from the view of passing traffic since the Scholtens moved there 16 years ago. And that shield is important: Their house is pretty close to the road compared to most newer homes along that road, and the truck traffic is incessant.
“They’re big, they’re loud, they’re constant,” Debra Scholten said.
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For months, it seems the days for these trees were numbered, like so many others that lined the former country roads – “glorified deer paths” as one local resident called them – in and around what has become the New Albany International Business Park.
But this story has a happy ending, at least for now, because Debra Scholten decided the trees in front of her house were worth fighting for, employing reasoning rather than ranting.
“At my age, 62, I’m too old to chain myself to a tree – especially in this weather,” she said with a laugh on a cold, windy day.
And she decided to do something because she has seen how development is playing out all around her.
In January 2022, Intel announced plans to construct a now-delayed $28 billion chip manufacturing facility in the New Albany International Business Park, creating the “silicon heartland.” In the nearly four years since, dozens of development projects have popped up in western Licking County, including proposals for asphalt and concrete-mixing plants, a growing number of data centers, housing and more.
Many of the mature trees along these former country roads were cut down in the past four years to make way for power lines, water and sewer pipes and natural gas lines to support the rapidly growing industrial complex in the New Albany-Johnstown area. Some of those trees gave way to wider roads – five-lane boulevards in many cases with two lanes in each direction and a fifth for turning, along with roundabouts at many intersections.
The Scholtens’ trees were targeted by Licking County for a lesser widening of Duncan Plains Road to gain a few feet to accommodate the many dump trucks and other big, construction-related vehicles that lumber by each day to and from the industrial park up the road.
And just this week, a construction crew showed up to install a large natural gas line along their side of the road. Another threat to the trees, Debra Scholten thought.
When a third-party agent showed up at their house last fall to explain the road widening project and offer a few thousand dollars in exchange for a sliver of their property and those two mature trees, the Scholtens were upset by all of it, but especially losing the trees. Through a third-party agent, the county offered $1,982 – $682 for lost land, and $1,300 for the loss of the trees.
That’s when Debra got busy doing some homework through research and talking with experts, and eventually creating a PowerPoint presentation that she showed to anyone who would listen.
She talked with a real estate agent who said the roadway expansion would affect the home’s resale value, if and when that day comes. The property would be diminished because the road would be closer to the house than it already is, and it would go from a little over four acres to just under four acres – a 4.05-acre oasis the Scholtens have allowed to return to nature, including native trees and plants serving as a haven for wildlife. Blue jays, rabbits, woodpeckers, deer, coyotes and three feral cats have found their way onto the property.
And an arborist appraised the replacement cost of the two trees at $12,480 – $8,760 for the older maple and $3,720 for the younger. Further, the arborist said a third maple near the Scholtens’ driveway is in danger of dying from root system stress that could occur during road construction, and the cost of trying to preserve that tree would be about $1,550.
But this isn’t about money, Debra said she told the county’s agent.
“I don’t want your money, I want you to save my trees,” she said she told the agent, who wanted them to sign paperwork granting an easement to the county and accepting less than $2,000 in exchange.
“They said that if we didn’t sign, we’d be saying we wanted our day in court” after mediation to appeal the offer, she said. And even then, the legal process offered little hope for saving the trees or being compensated at what the Scholtens thought was a fair amount.
But she kept talking with anyone who would listen, including a couple of news reporters and the county’s agent. She happened to mention to the agent that she had talked with reporters.
She made one last counter offer after that.
“It was on the Saturday before the Christmas holiday. We countered with $6,000 of total compensation, and he said, ‘Yes, we’ll do it.’ And he came right over.”
He mentioned that he appreciated that it wasn’t a battle with them, she said.
“We signed, and that was it,” she said. “Or so I thought. He called the following Tuesday, just before Christmas, and he said, ‘Hey, we have a new plan. It moves the ditch three feet away from the tree. We can’t guarantee the tree will live, and if it doesn’t, it’ll be on you (to remove it.)’ And he said we won’t lose any property.”
She doesn’t know what changed or why, but she’s taking the win.
“I don’t want to get too excited, because it could die, but hopeful for now,” she said on Wednesday, Jan. 14, even as the natural-gas-line installers were piling up sections of pipe in front of her house. Debra said she talked with the installers, who promised to use new technology to thread the pipe five feet under her trees rather than dig a trench and disturb them.
The Scholtens plan to use the $6,000 they receive from the county to do whatever they can now to mitigate the construction effects on their trees, including feeding them nutrients ahead of the roadwork.
“You know, you feel powerless in a situation like this, but it makes me hopeful that you can make a change,” Debra Scholten said.
Nation Dixon and Alan Miller write for TheReportingProject.org, the nonprofit news organization of Denison University’s Journalism program, which is supported by generous donations from readers. Sign up for The Reporting Project newsletter here.