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By Jorge Casuso

February 22 -- The Downtown ficus trees slated for removal were given a reprieve Thursday when a Superior Court judge agreed to set a hearing for a preliminary injunction next week.

Judge Ann I. Jones set a hearing for Thursday after the Treesavers rushed to court two days after the City Council voted to deny an appeal of a Landmarks Commission decision to deny the trees along 2nd and 4th streets landmark status.

The hearing had originally been set for Friday, but the date was changed when Jones took over the case after the previous judge was given a new assignment.

City officials have agreed to wait for the Jones’ ruling before beginning to remove the 23 ficus trees they deem to be “structurally unstable” and relocate another 31 of the 153 ficus that line the two Downtown streets.

Treesavers, the fledgling group that has blossomed during the ficus tree controversy, has vowed to continue fighting if the judge fails to grant a temporary injunction to halt the axe until the case can be heard.

“Whatever has to be done legally, Treesavers will do,” said Jerry Rubin, the local activist who heads the group. “Whatever we have to do diplomatically and politically, we will do.”

Treesavers has been holding training sessions in civil disobedience and Rubin said members of the group are prepared to chain themselves to the trees if necessary.

“Students, grandmothers grandfathers and many others” are being trained in case “it ever comes to a time when people have to in a peaceful non-violent way defend the trees,” Rubin said.

Rubin would like the City to halt the ax while it hammers out a citywide tree policy the council is scheduled to take up at an upcoming meeting.

“Let’s not blemish he process. Let’s have long thorough analysis,” Rubin said. “It deserves a lot of time to hash out a new tree policy.

“Why should 2nd and 4th streets be the test case for a tree policy that hasn’t even been formulated yet?” he said.

City staff has warned that changing the project could jeopardize the State and Federal Transportation funds earmarked for the $8.2 million streetscape project that includes repairing sidewalks torn up by the ficus trees and adding new lighting.

The City’s community forester, Walt Warriner has warned that the ficus, which are more than 40 years old and expected to only last another 10 to 20 years, have been weakened by root-pruning, which can cause the trees to drop limbs or even fall over.

But critics have called the plan to remove 54 ficus trees and 21 palms, and install 139 new Ginkgo trees along the streets flanking the popular Third Street Promenade unnecessary and anti-environmental.

The lawsuit filed by the Treesavers questions the process that resulted in a contract for the streetscape project authorized by the City Council last August. The plaintiffs argued that the City should have conducted an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) before it issued the contract for the work.

The City countered that a full-blown EIR was not needed, because California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) reviews had already been conducted in 1996 and 1997, when the Bayside District Specific Plan, which included the streetscape project, was approved.

In addition to removing the 54 ficus trees, the plan approved by the council in October 2005 calls for adding decorative up-lighting to the remaining ficus trees, repairing sidewalks or curbs damaged by the trees, enlarging tree wells and installing new pedestrian lighting. It also calls for enhancing the six mid-block crosswalks on 2nd and 4th streets.

Funding for this project comes from various sources, including an initial grant of $2.169 million from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and $1.836 million in Federal Transportation Enhancement Activities funds.

Downtown officials hope the more inviting streetscape will lure strollers from the bustling Promenade to the restaurants and businesses along 2nd and 4th.

The plan is part of an ambitious redesign to make over the Downtown that has included the launching of the Promenade in 1989, the elimination of one-way streets, and the creation of the Transit Mall, which included widening the sidewalks on Santa Monica Boulevard. and on Broadway and installing new benches and bus stops.