Tree-trimming work to resume around Holton power lines

Tree-trimming work to keep City of Holton-owned power utili­ty lines clear of “undesirable vege­tation” is scheduled to resume in and around the city in the near future, according to a notice included in monthly city utility bills sent out this month.

Last year, Poor Boy Tree Ser­vice of Fair Play, Mo., performed tree and brush-trimming work around the city’s primary electrical system, mainly around city-owned power lines within the city and in areas outside the city limits that are served by more than 90 miles’ worth of city power lines.

The notice included with utility bills states that Poor Boy will re­turn to Holton “in the coming weeks” to perform more tree and brush-trimming work with the goal of reducing tree-related outages and hazards with the electrical dis­tribution system and increasing the reliability of the system, as well as the development of “lush grassy areas that do not interfere with overhead power lines, pose a fire hazard or hamper access to the in­frastructure,” it was reported.

According to the notice, Poor Boy personnel will be pruning trees, limbs and brush “a minimum of 10 feet from the outside primary conductor of all high-voltate power lines (that) are owned and main­tained by the City of Holton.” A variety of methods will be utilized, including mechanical trimming and chemical applications, and pruning will be done according to International Society of Arboricul­ture (ISA) standards.

Trimming work will also in­volve chemicals that, according to the notice, “will have no adverse effects of humans, cattle, horses or house pets,” and special care will be taken to avoid harming gardens, crops and ornamental trees located on city utility customers’ yards.

The trimming work was first re­quested by the Holton City Com­mission in the spring of 2024 after Holton Electrical Distribution Su­perintendent Corey Schuetz sug­gested that hiring an outside con­tractor to trim trees and brush in electric line easements would al­low city workers to spend less time trimming trees and more time working on utility lines.

Last August, Schuetz told city commissioners that their decision to hire Poor Boy to perform vege­tation control at a cost not to ex­ceed $100,000 had resulted in the trimming of “a little more than a mile” of tree branches, with excep­tions made for properties where trimming was declined by the property owner or the property ap­peared to be “well-manicured.”

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