Forest Defenders, Landowners and Bushnell Discuss EVM
Signs on a large fir tree along Ettersburg Road [Photo by Lisa Music]
The residents of the Telegraph Ridge area west of Garberville had met once already to discuss what they had individually been experiencing in their interactions with the various PG&E subcontractors who had been tagging trees for removal and other subcontractors who had been performing the tree removal work.
Their experiences were as varied as the individuals themselves, but the overarching theme was one of disconnect. Some residents welcomed the removal of potentially hazardous trees but had found dealing with the mess the subcontractors had left behind to be cumbersome and an additional fire hazard. Others, after persistent efforts to contact management within the subcontracted company, were able to insist cleared brush and limbs were chipped and logs were left in a manageable area for the property owner to deal with later.
Some residents said they were told that they would be financially responsible if a fallen tree caused a fire after refusing EVM work, while other subcontractors told residents that they were allowed to refuse EVM work without liability.
Resident Gil Gregori told the group that legally, PG&E and their subcontractors had to attempt to contact property owners before marking or removing any vegetation; something property owner and Telegraph Ridge Fire Chief Peter Lawsky, along with several others, said did not happen. Lawsky said he came home to find work trucks in his driveway and personnel marking trees. Lawsky does not have PG&E and as far as he can ascertain, there is no utility easement attached to his property deed. Lawsky said he has had the same publicly listed phone number for decades, and, according to him, no attempt to contact him was made.
Most of the residents agreed that the subcontractors were nice individuals tasked with a difficult job but often said things that contradicted information given by other crews. One crew would tell the property owners one thing, only to have a different crew arrive with a different set of information and plans.
Huckleberry Hill property owner, Johnny Casali said he was afraid to leave his property to come home and find crews cutting down trees he had grown to love.
After the first Telegraph Ridge meeting, Sanctuary Forest Development, Education and Administrative Director, Anna Rogers, along with Supervisor Bushnell and other community members, met with PG&E representatives via Zoom. Bushnell listened to her concerned constituents at the April 16th gathering at the Telegraph Ridge Volunteer Fire Department before sharing with the group what she had learned at that meeting.
Casali was one of the first to speak, telling the group that he had been in contact with a PG&E forester. Casali said, “He informed me that something had happened; the neighborhood had touched enough people and contacted enough people that [PG&E was] reevaluating moving forward and that they were going to put a hold on their operations for the next …two to three months…They were going to be evaluating what they were doing and if they were being overly aggressive.”
Gregori stated he was also told that PG&E was reevaluating their EVM program.
However, a group of activists, calling themselves Forest Defenders, said that after working for four months in the Humboldt Redwoods State Park, they did not believe that the subcontractors would be dissuaded. One of the defenders told the group, “It’s a monster that will not be stopped.”
Forest defender Finch said that the group became aware of the EVM work being done in the park while studying endangered species. The group had located the endangered fisher in the park and had noticed many old-growth trees marked for removal.
Although the group rotated 12-hour watch shifts, they were not able to prevent the cutting of some of the old-growth trees. “We were able to save almost all of the old growth that we knew of. We did lose some, but…they weren’t able to complete the project,” forest-defender Farmer said.
The group said that the EVM subcontractors were dogged in their efforts to remove trees regardless of what subcontractors said to the group. “No matter how many times PG&E said they’d take them off the list, next week or even a few days later some new people would show up, coming to cut the tree…The only way we’ve found to really stop them is to be there, to show up,” Farmer told the group at Telegraph Ridge.
After four months, the forest defenders say that the EVM cutting has stopped in the Humboldt Redwoods State Park but will resume in the fall. “Right now, they can’t cut in there because it’s Spotted Owl and Marbled Murrelet nesting season but as soon as September 15th rolls around, they can go back in…They have a whole plan that the park has agreed to,” Farmer said.
Resident Johanna Johnson, who said she has large transmission lines that dissect her property, told the group that in the past PG&E crews would come out in the winter, cut brush and trees that were under the lines or within twenty feet of the lines, burning what they cut. Johnson said that was an effective method of vegetation management. However, she said that crews stopped doing those methods years ago. “I’ve got head-high brush with limbs dropped on it. It’s in a steep ravine, and they just leave it like that. I’ve been fighting PG&E for years to do the right thing, but they just won’t do it,” she said.
When Supervisor Bushnell spoke, she quickly dashed the group’s hopes that PG&E was rethinking the implementation of their EVM program, “I don’t know why he said that…that is not a true statement.”
Bushnell did have good news for the group, “They are…going to scale back on private lands and try harder to contact landowners and make sure they get [consent] to be there.”
During her prior meeting with PG&E representatives, Bushnell said that there was a disconnect between those in charge of the program and those on the ground speaking with property owners. Not only is PG&E not reconsidering the EVM Program, but they also told Bushnell that subcontractors should not be discussing liability concerns with property owners.
According to Bushnell, PG&E reps were surprised to learn that contacting them directly was a difficult task. She is working on getting her constituents a contact number for a person in charge at PG&E to mitigate some of the issues with communications between property owners, subcontractors, and PG&E.
Rogers, who had also attended the meeting with PG&E representatives, said that getting clear and concise answers from the reps was at times difficult.
However, Bushnell said she was able to get confirmation that, at this time, there are no plans to spray herbicide in the Ettersburg, Salmon Creek or Alderpoint areas.
Green Diamond, who owns large tracts of land in Humboldt County said that they are refusing PG&E’s use of herbicides on their land after talking with Bushnell about neighboring property owners’ concerns. We were told that residents may see PG&E subcontractors with backpack sprayers containing water while performing tree and brush removal, a requirement for fire safety when using chainsaws.
The residents appeared relieved to have the threat of herbicide spraying off the table for the time being and seemed invigorated to have Bushnell’s support in contacting PG&E. However, Teri Benoit told the group to remain vigilant as she believes PG&E is working on passing legislation through congress, quietly, that will allow PG&E to ignore property owners wishes.
Bushnell told the group that she has constituents that are both for and against the EVM Program and aims to support all of constituents in their rights when dealing with PG&E and their subcontractors. “…As a landowner you have a right to say no,” she told them. “You have a right to say limb it up, top it off, leave the tree.”
Rogers and Bushnell stressed to the property owners that contrary to what the subcontractors were telling private landowners, they had a right to walk their property with crews and create a vegetation management plan that worked for them.
Of concern for the county, Bushnell said, are the public road drainages. She told the group that the county had issued a stop work order on PG&E’s EVM work being done in the Salmon Creek area until the issue of subcontractors not clearing the debris from the drainages is resolved. She encouraged the group to reach out if they witnessed any drainage blockages from EVM work, as the trees and debris inhibited county road crews from maintaining their drainages.
She told us that Humboldt County residents should reach out to all five of the county’s supervisors in order to be heard. She pointed out that she is just one vote out of five. Regardless of where residents stand on PG&E’s EVM Program, Bushnell urges them to reach out to the Board of Supervisors for help with their concerns.
Earlier:
- ‘The Slaughter Has Begun’: In an Attempt to Mitigate the Threat of Wildfire, PG&E Cuts a Wide Swath Through a Southern Humboldt Community
- Without Consent: Landowners Battle PG&E’s ‘Moonscaping’
- Humboldt County Issues Stop Work Order, PG&E Removes Contractor on EVM in SoHum After Complaints/Video by Residents
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if you don’t want the trees down, then a good option is to bury the lines at the owners expense
That’s not a good option at all. Here is one, cap pge’s executive pay to no more than 10X their lowest paid worker, and cap profits with excess earmarked for these types of infrastructure improvements.
PG&E out of California! Humboldt County Board of Supervisors out of California!
Remember everyone, that “clean energy” that PGE or Sonoma Clean power is promoting is running thru these lines. Thousands of people driving around cutting trees down in gas powered vehicles. Working in the rain, putting sediment in the creeks and rivers.
Your “clean power” is not clean
Neither are the batteries for those “clean energy” cars. And those electric cars…how does that electricity get produced? Oh right- magic!! Everything will be fine just fine…
Is there any replanting programs? We have a small army here in sohum willing to replant.
My understanding is the sequoia sempervirus (sp?) Grows extremely fast, tall and gorgeous.
Is there a 503 or is anyone considering a reforestation idea?
Replant, Fast tall and gorgeous? How about they should bury lines and cut shareholder profits?
100% agree with burrying the lines. A lot of the trees they cut in sohum saved a lot of people’s lives by stopping them going down the mountain. I also just really like trees, call me old fashioned.
that would be great, but it’s never gonna happen. the cost alone is prohibitive and consider all the other infrastructure that is already buried.
Ummm, redwoods, madrone and tan oak resprout. It’s called Sequoia sempervirens, easily found in a dictionary. So you want to replant trees that have been felled and trimmed under and around the lines that will grow into the lines again and have to be cut down again in the future followed by the those who planted them complaining to Pge about having them cut down again. Have you considered what you just stated. How about planting fruit trees under and around the lines, which PGE allows because they do not encroach upon the lines, are easily maintained, deciduous, and pose no fire hazard. Botton line, you blew it if you bought a property with Pge power lines transecting it and you think Pge is not going to come on your property and maintain the easement they own. Solution, tell Pge to remove the lines if you are the last house on the circuit. Then go buy a generator for your power and suck it up.Or pay for burying your own lines, don’t raise my rates because you are to cheap to deal with your own aesthetic problems. Otherwise, stop complaining or move to another state.
It’s not about PGE maintaining their element. It’s about PGE encroaching on lands beyond their easement. They’re destroying the biggest trees, They’re killing listed species. They have been chipping as they go, after the debacle in Salmon Creek, but leaving logs perched across watercourses, on steep slopes above roads and homes. And they’ve started a new approach after Salmon Creek, where they try to coerce landowners into signing “vegetation management contracts” that absolve them from financial and criminal liability. That means the landowner won’t get paid for the trees they destroy ( which state law requires) and the landowner assumes legal responsibility for violating environmental laws. No thanks.
Loaned my dictionary to the last Ken and never got it back. I’ll work on it. Thx
My God sir, a person with some common sense. Thank you for your post. You are 100% correct
The whole point is to NOT have trees growing near the powerlines.
I’m pretty sure the tree was there first.
Oh no there’s a power line near Richardson Grove.. let’s clear cut it.. smh
great point@suggestion,i’de love to see more redwoods around.let’s hope there’s a reforestation plan..
If you purchased you property with a utility easement threw your property then you have to let the utility easement maintain there easement.
Read your title report that was given to you when you purchased your property.
Nice trees in the easement will be removed for safety reasons. If you would like to have the cut trees put in a place more useful for the property owner then the property owner needs to maintain the easement themselves and except responsibility for the easement if it causes a fire.
This is a safety issue and the property owners need to understand their rights.
PG&E has the right maintain there easement that you share threw your land.
If you do not like what PG&E is doing on the utility easement then you should have not bought your property with with easements on them.
See above. They’re going beyond their easements. They’re generally expanding their easements by a process known as “takings.” The standard width of an easement for a 60KV transmission line is 40 feet (20 feet on either side of the center line) The standard width of a 12 KV distribution line is 20 feet (ten feet on either side of the center). Their longterm plan is to expand their area by as far from their lines as the height of the highest trees. As much as 2 football fields wide. Now, you look at your property and figure whether you want two football fields width of it clear-cut and sprayed with Roundup. And accept that if you haven’t had to deal with PGE and utility rights of way, you’re coming from a place of smugness, not knowledge.
If a 100′ tall tree is growing 75′ from the lines, and is leaning distinctly towards the lines, what will happen when it falls? They all fall sooner or later.
Don’t get me wrong; there are plenty of legitimate complaints about all aspects of this program. And as stated in the article, different folks in different areas have had different experiences. In my neighborhood, I question some of the trees that were both cut and not cut. I’ve been a professional hazard tree faller on wildfires since the late ’80’s, for the credential on my opinion. But on the next parcel over, they cut a 60″ Douglas fir, that had heart rot, exposed in the cross section of the cut trunk. Whichever forester marked that one, did their job well.
They should be required to manage the brush (without the use of herbicides) under the lines as well as the the trunks and limbs within reach of the lines. I have a small forestry crew and we’ve been cleaning up their messes for decades. I’ll look forward to the day when the lines are buried.
So Dave… if a tree catches fire, while it is standing… does it burn up or down? not all trees fall ”sooner or later”.you should know this.
“This is a safety issue and the property owners need to understand their rights.”
That’s exactly what people are doing. Shoot first, ask no questions before during or after, isn’t right. If you’ve seen one exception to what you’d call ‘proper conduct’, you’d understand the driving force (literally) behind the grand operation. And if you haven’t seen any exceptions to proper conduct on the part of PG&E, then you don’t understand the issue.
most of what you just said is FALSE. ive been dealing w/ this nightmare for 10 + yrs. you make it sound so simple. move away? get real.
The solution for the utility is to use the American work visa program to get foreign workers to do the line clearings.
At the very least Puerto Ricans, like is done in my area under the “Trees Inc” company.
Then the laborers are a sufficiently disadvantaged group, so the project cant be protested as easily by 90s era environmental activists that get hung up on social justice issues.
Its not as easy make a case for stopping projects when the workers/laborers are , well, from a social justice perspective, disadvantaged, and if the protesting party, well, is essentially the privileged landowning class.
Josh pge vegetation management . 707 572 0133
Before anybody complains, have you ever had a tree cut down for a view? A tree cut down for a garden to be built, or to “open up more light” to your greenhouses?
What’s the difference between people who did those things to grow weed, and the pge contractors doing this work?
I cut down many a tree that were endangering a home. Or that blocked light to a greenhouse.
Is cutting down an old growth redwood to save a power line acceptable? No. But is it asking too much to cut and clear fast growing and fast reproducing trees and brush?
Come on, this is an emotional discussion. Leave your logic out of it!
Well put.
The trees they cut on Brice thorn rd, ettersberg, lighthouse we’re unnecessary in my opinion.
The big trees stopping you or your loved one from rolling down the hill in an accident situation, most of those trees are no longer there.
I assume our hillsides and roads will furthermore degrade and erode as the trees and there function are no longer existent. But I’m no expert.
As history already tells us about what we’ve seen done, history will see PG&E’s activity for what it is: a giant corporate/government entity shooting the people first, and not asking any questions before during or after. And they will get away with it, because they are getting away with it.
I used to run a garbage route back in the early 90s in Southern Humboldt. What a bunch of bull. Coming from the very people that sucked the watersheds dry poisoning the environment with insecticides rat poisoning and diesel spills. Not all, but a majority of the grows were like this .
Yes…there are some good people. But being around here since late 70s I was extremely discouraged to see the collapse of morals and ethics in our growing community. Money doesn’t talk- it swears. On a different point I’d like to thank the front-line forest defenders out there protecting the old trees and our endangered fishers. This is an instance where there is no reasonable alternative to direct action to slow down the machine. Thank You!
YOU DEFEND THE FOREST WITH CHAINSAWS, NOT LETTING IT ALL BURN DOWN PEOPLE! … Redwoods are touchy… but DOUG FIR?
I’ve been observing the tree clearing through the BLM property in Whitethorn BLM building with a relatively conservative clearing on either side of power lines that run through the property. Clean, no site if trees laying on the ground. Nothing wider than 10-20 feet on either side of electrical power lines.
Meanwhile, Ettersberg is an atrocious mess with trees cut far from falling distance of power lines. And logs left strewn all over the hillside. Meanwhile, other trees stand close to the power lines. No real sense being made.
Dead trees sit close to power lines. Trees cut halfway that will die over the years creating fire hazard in our community.
We are not being served well with the current plan. ( no disrespect to the hardworking crews) but the planning is a shit show.