FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — A group of Fayetteville residents are bringing awareness and advocating for the trees on the site of the future Fayetteville High School parking garage. They gathered Sunday morning to honor those trees.
At Tuesday night's city council meeting, the Fayetteville City Council voted to vacate a tree preservation easement for the property. The move allows the district to remove six trees that are over 100 years old and in fair or poor condition. The one tree that is in good condition will not be cut down.
Mary Lightheart, who is no stranger to fighting for the trees, was a part of the group advocating for the trees. She said the group wanted to share just how valuable the trees are to the city and its residents.
"To let people walk, touch them, walk around here, feel it, know how important they are, and to just get information out," Lightheart said.
In 2000, the Fayetteville City Council voted to vacate an easement that protected trees near the Steele Crossing area to build a Kohl's. Lightheart was there to protest the council's vote back then.
"I said, 'Well, I want to go see these trees,'" Lightheart said of the 2000 vote. "By 10 o'clock in the morning, I was sitting in one ... Three weeks later, because of politics and some things, they forced me down. It was just the most powerful experience. I can't even explain how living in a tree is."
Now, over two decades later, Lightheart is advocating with others for the same cause.
"These trees have been here longer than anybody in Northwest Arkansas," said Andrea Fournet, who came to say goodbye to the trees.
The high school has faced parking issues for years and a parking garage was one way to combat it. There are 850 parking spaces currently available on the Fayetteville High School campus — 300 for faculty and 550 for students.
At the meeting, residents discussed other solutions.
"I think that there are other options for solving this problem, and they just tried to push it through too fast," Fournet said. "We can figure out ways to do shuttles. We can figure out ways to do a walking bridge over MLK. There are options."
In the proposal that the council voted on, this easement will be replaced with a new easement that's three times the size and will be at a different location.
"Part of the proposal was to replace the existing easement that was about two-thirds of an acre with an alternate easement that's over two acres, so more than triple the size," Fayetteville Superintendent Dr. John Mulford said. "It includes several significant trees, 63 trees total. And then part of that, we're going to plant an additional 50 or so trees to replace the canopy that's coming down."
After hours of conversation and public comment, the council voted 5-3, with council members Sarah Moore, Bob Stafford, and Teresa Turk voting against it.
"It shouldn't take an easement, a protective easement, to come down here, look at these trees and say, 'Hey, you know what? This isn't the spot,'" Bob Stafford said. "When we make these ordinances, they're supposed to be permanent, and we shouldn't be reviewing these."
He said he knows there's an issue with parking at Fayetteville High School, but he wanted them to take into consideration other factors.
"Fayetteville loves their trees. They always have and they always will. It's what makes our city so special," Stafford said. "We need to start looking at this differently, climate change, the growth of the density, and the traffic problems we're creating."
Mulford said the district's next steps for the garage are working with their architect on design and they'll have to go through the city for an approval process. They are hopeful to break ground in the spring and have the spaces available for the 2026-2027 school year.
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