Davey Tree : Vegetation Management : Trinity Public Utilities District: Improving Accountability in Vegetation Management

Trinity Public Utilities District: Improving Accountability in Vegetation Management

Trinity Public Utilities District (TPUD) in Northern California improved its vegetation management program since it called upon the expertise of Davey Resource Group (DRG).

Prior to DRG, TPUD used a traditional approach in managing its line clearance activities. Tree trimming contractors were directed to inspect, notify residents and trim circuits on a routine cycle. However, needs for reliability and customer service required frequent �hot spotting� that competed with the work. As a result, trim cycles were not meeting goals, and service reliability was suffering.

From 2003 until early 2006, DRG provided TPUD a consulting utility forester to help develop a systematic approach to performing vegetation management. This included inspecting and pre-planning work for production based contractors and performing quality assurance audits of their work. The forester also audited poles requiring vegetation clearing at the base, noting those that did not need mitigation.

Schedule attainment was achieved, and tree crew production increased. Crews were able to concentrate on the program�s objectives because they drove only to locations that needed work. In addition, people had a better understanding of the work because the certified arborist met with the district�s customers and public agency representatives prior to the tree work. Subsequently, customer concerns were extremely low.

A key benefit of this program was significantly lower outage rates on circuits that were trimmed. In addition, this vegetation management program reduced equipment damage and overtime emergency response. All of these results were delivered without a significant increase in TPUD�s budget while improving public relations.

For more information, contact Jack McCabe at (805) 438-1502, or call (800) 966-2021.