Tree Removal Licenses in Broward County

Broward County prohibits removing any tree without a license, and the section that says so states no diameter threshold. Whether the county or your city administers that rule turns on a fact that sits in the county code rather than in any city ordinance: certification is revocable, and every municipal certification in the county expired in 2026. TWQ Landscaping prepares and files these applications, and our ISA Certified Arborist (NY-6948A) produces the supporting report where one is required.

Does This Apply to Your Property?

Section 27-402 applies the article to all persons within the geographic boundaries of Broward County, enforceable county-wide unless the article provides otherwise. Twenty-three municipalities hold certification and enforce their own ordinance in place of county enforcement: Coconut Creek, Cooper City, Coral Springs, Dania Beach, Davie, Deerfield Beach, Fort Lauderdale, Hallandale Beach, Hollywood, Lauderhill, Margate, Miramar, Oakland Park, Parkland, Pembroke Pines, Plantation, Pompano Beach, Sea Ranch Lakes, Southwest Ranches, Sunrise, Tamarac, West Park and Weston.

Eight are enforced by the county directly, along with unincorporated Broward: Hillsboro Beach, Lauderdale-By-The-Sea, Lauderdale Lakes, Lazy Lake, Lighthouse Point, North Lauderdale, Pembroke Park and Wilton Manors. School Board property, county property and county environmentally designated lands are enforced county-wide whichever city they sit in.

Here is the part that is not in any city ordinance. Ordinance 2025-39, adopted 13 November 2025, required every previously certified city to request recertification, and provided that certifications existing before that date remain in effect for one hundred eighty days and thereafter expire. That ran to about 12 May 2026. Which cities have since requested and received recertification is an administrative list held by the county, not a codified fact, and where a certification has lapsed county authority revives and the county license applies even in a city listed above as certified.

What Needs a License

Section 27-405 sets out seven prohibitions, and learning them covers a large part of Broward because the certified cities are required to be at least as stringent and many reproduce the language. No person shall remove a historical tree without Board approval, or remove any tree without first obtaining a tree removal license, or commit tree abuse as the article defines it.

The other four reach work that never removes anything. No encroachment, excavation or change of natural grade within a drip line unless it can be demonstrated beforehand that the activity will not negatively impact the tree. No land clearing or operation of heavy equipment near a tree without placing and maintaining a protective barrier around the drip line. No storage or use of materials or equipment within a drip line, and no attachments to a tree other than protective ones. And no land clearing in a Natural Forest Community, including removal of understory, without a letter of authorization or a license.

A tree can also become a historical tree on age alone. Section 27-412 lets the Board designate a tree that sits on historically significant property, or is uniquely related to the heritage of Broward County, or is at least seventy-five years old. Seventy-five years standing by itself qualifies, and an owner may request the designation for a tree on their own property. It is worth checking for a designation before quoting on a large old tree in an unincorporated or non-certified area.

The Exemptions, and What Each One Requires

The exemption most relevant to a board runs through a credential. Section 27-406(c) exempts the pruning, trimming, removal or replanting of a tree on residential property from every notice, application, approval, permit, fee and mitigation requirement of the article, where the owner holds documentation from an arborist certified by the International Society of Arboriculture, or a Florida licensed landscape architect, that the tree poses an unacceptable risk. At county level that exemption covers pruning and trimming and not only removal, and it expressly does not reach mangrove protection under Florida Statutes.

The single-family exemption at Section 27-408(a)(3) has three cumulative conditions and two exceptions. It covers removal of any tree on owner-occupied residential property of one acre or less developed for detached single-family and duplex usage. All three conditions are required, so a rented house does not qualify and neither does a larger lot. And it falls away for a previously preserved, relocated or replaced tree that was dealt with under an earlier license, and for a historical or specimen tree.

A hazardous tree posing an imminent threat may be removed, but the documentation obligation sits before the saw. The owner must document the condition by photographs or other evidence before removal, and for a natural forest community, specimen or historical tree must present that documentation to the department within forty-eight hours of removal. Exemptions generally apply only where no nuisance or condition adversely affecting the environment or public health is created.

What It Costs

The license itself is modest and the replacement obligation is what shapes a budget. Administrative Code Section 40.23 sets the initial license at $100.00 for a developed single-family or duplex property, $150.00 for other developed residential and $250.00 for all other property. Each tree proposed for removal or relocation adds $25.00 under 18 inches DBH and $50.00 at 18 inches and over. A modification to an existing license is a further $100.00, and fees are non-refundable and non-transferable.

Removing first and licensing afterwards doubles the per-tree rate, to $50.00 under 18 inches and $100.00 at 18 inches and over. That is the number worth putting in front of anyone who suggests starting before the paperwork clears.

Replacement is graded into four categories and at least half of the replacement trees must come from the top two. Category 1 is a minimum of twelve feet in height and two inches DBH at planting, Category 2 a minimum of eight feet, Category 3 a minimum of six feet, and Category 4, for replacement palms, a minimum of six feet of clear trunk or greywood. Where mitigation is paid rather than planted it goes to the Broward County Tree Preservation Trust Fund, whose disbursements are restricted to named purposes including planting on public lands and at childcare facilities.

What Happens If It Is Done Without a License

Section 27-410 places the remedy on the person who did the work rather than only on the owner. A violator must undertake pruning and other remedial action as the department determines, which is not limited to removing severely abused trees, and a tree removal license must then be applied for by the violator or the owner for that removal. Where the natural habit of growth of an abused tree is destroyed, replacement trees must be planted under the license standards.

Two on-site limits carry their own exposure. A person conducting tree removal activities may only remove the trees the license approves, and damage to any other tree on the site is a violation in its own terms. Certified cities reproduce both.

What to Check With Your Contractor

The most important thing on this page for a contractor is that certification does not shelter them. Section 27-407(d) retains county authority, notwithstanding any municipal certification, over county property, School Board property, sites designated by the Board as environmentally significant, and tree abuse committed by licensed or unlicensed tree trimmers that the certified municipality has not otherwise enforced. That last category appears in no city ordinance, and it means working in a certified city does not put a crew beyond the county's reach on abuse.

Section 27-409 specifies the machinery. Vegetation inside the drip line of a tree designated for preservation may be cleared only by hand or with light rubber-wheeled equipment that will not damage roots, and that equipment is capped at forty-eight inches wide tire to tire with a maximum weight of 3,500 pounds. Most compact loaders exceed it. Retaining walls and drywells must be used to protect preserved trees from severe grade changes, and damage during construction carries a repair duty: corrective pruning for canopy damage, and corrective root pruning, fertilization and soil enhancements for root damage.

Tree trimmers are licensed separately. Administrative Code Section 40.34 sets both Class A and Class B at $230.00, effective for two years from the date of issue, amended by Ordinance 2025-038 adopted 25 February 2025 and effective 1 May 2025. The two classes cost exactly the same, so there is no price reason to hold the lower one.

What to Do Next

Two things are worth settling before work is scheduled anywhere in Broward. Whether the city you are in currently holds a valid certification, because that decides who issues the license and it cannot be answered from the code. And whether any tree in scope is a specimen or historical tree, or was preserved under an earlier license, since each of those removes the exemption a property might otherwise rely on.

Applications go to the Public Works and Environmental Services Department, Environmental Permitting Division, Tree Preservation Program, at 1 North University Drive, Mailbox 201, Plantation, Florida 33324, or through the county ePermits portal. General licensing questions go to 954-519-1224, and whether a license is required at all, along with pruning and mangrove questions, to 954-519-1483.

We settle those before quoting. We inspect the trees, document species, size and condition, prepare the arborist report where the application calls for one, file the license, install protection barriers to the county standard, and handle replacement planting or the trust fund contribution where mitigation applies. TWQ Landscaping handles tree permitting for the properties we maintain across Broward, Palm Beach and Miami-Dade: community associations and condominiums, commercial and industrial sites, medical and senior living campuses, schools, religious campuses, hotels, multifamily rental, self-storage, dealerships, retail outparcels, marinas, mobile home communities, municipal grounds and mixed-use. Call (954) 583-4752 or request a proposal.

The information presented on this page was accurate as of 18 August 2026.

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