Some of the cities within San Diego County have policy boards or committees that advise the city on tree planting.

San Diego has an award-winning Community Forest Advisory Board that is charged with advising the Mayor on all policy issues relating to urban forestry. There are fourteen board members appointed by the Mayor and the City Council.

Communities within the City also have their groups with interests in tree planting policy.  The City of San Diego maintains a web site for Community Planning Groups.  On the web site are links to a Community Contact List and Community/Land Use Plans.

Other cities around the county have community groups that influence tree planting policy.   La Mesa Beautiful is a non-profit organization that has been in
La Mesa, Ca for over 30 years. They have annual awards celebrations honoring citizens of La Mesa for their help in keeping La Mesa Beautiful. They also give out horticultural scholarships annually to Cuyamaca Community College students and El Capitan Students.

The  county of San Diego has 18 incorporated cities.The county and each city has ordinances and regulations with regard to trees; not all are alike.  The ordinances and regulations cover planting, maintaining, removing, replacing and preserving trees in the city's rights-of-way and other public places.

ANSI A300 covers pruning, soil management, supplemental support systems, lightning protection systems, management, transplanting, integrated vegetation management, tree risk management, and integrated pest management.

Whenever people are living together as a community, conflicts may arise. Laws have usually been established to settle these differences. Neighbor tree law is an example, and the results may be surprising.

California is considered to be more progressive in its approach to legislation concerning climate change and has laws, studies, and recommendations about water, trees, solar energy with regard to climate change.

As San Diegans too painfully know from the Rice Fire of October 2007, trees near power lines need to be carefully controlled.  According to the incident report from the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, SDG&E was in violation of improperly maintaining trees in the vicinity of power lines.  The Rice Fire started when a limb from a sycamore tree broke and fell through an overhead power conductor.  Laws pertaining to trees and fire go beyond neighbor concerns and address public safety.