Lublin up in arms over its branches
The dispute arose after Lublin landed Herbapol with a bill of zł.266,000 after it cut down the trees to build a logistics center on ul. Domaniewska.
Three years ago the company purchased a half-hectare land plot for the facility. The company applied for the construction permit last year and, as part of the works, it needed to cut down five trees on the site. The Municipal Inspectorate of Environmental Protection (MIO) gave permission for this in August but demanded that Herbapol pay zł.53,000 per tree.
The company took the issue to court and argued that the Polish legislation on environmental protection says that no fees are charged for felling trees as long as they grew after an area was designated as a construction plot. Herbapol's site has had this status since 1987. The company appealed to the Samorzadowe Kolegium Odwoławcze (Local Board of Appeals), which overruled the MIO decision. MIO, however, was undeterred and continued to demand the cash.
Then the conflict was to be settled by a special examination of the trees' age. It turned out that four of the five trees were planted before 1987, that is before the last spatial development plan was enacted. According to MIO, this means that Herbapol has to pay for felling the trees.
However, the technical director at Herbapol, Wojciech Staniak, points to the spatial development plan from 1961, in which the plot was designated as for construction, as the relevant plan. "The trees were planted after 1961, thus, we are not going to pay anything," he insisted.
The conflict is now back with the Local Board of Appeals.
