#westhollywood how is it possible the City has no control over the power company cutting down stunning 25 year old shade trees you planted on Hilldale without notice to the neighborhood — when trimming would’ve sufficed!?
— Phil Lobel, on Facebook
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Mr. Lobel,
I understand your concern. Just a little background, California Public Utilities Commission provides the utility companies authority to remove and/or trim trees on public and private property, to prevent fires, injuries and maintain the reliability of the power supply. We do work with them as much as possible, but we cannot stop them from removing or poorly trimming trees. Moving forward, we will assess the location and see what we can plant that will not have the potential for conflict with the power lines in the future.
— Helen Collins
City of West Hollywood
Facilities and Field Services Div., Mgr
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Helen, I do appreciate the swift response on the email.
However, based on what you were saying, I’d say 20% of the trees could be taken down without notice by the power company because there are lines in the vicinity. If you look closely at the video, you will see that there were no powerlines directly above, and all that was needed was a trimming of the trees.
In this time of global warming and cities looking to mitigate the heat that is created by concrete and urbanization, Â planting trees has become a priority.
I think that City of West Hollywood should work with the power company to reevaluate this process of unilaterally and indiscriminately cutting down trees without notice to neighbors or reviewing other options.
— Phil Lobel
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Hi Phil,
I agree!
Best,
— Lauren Meister
Councilmember,
City of West Hollywood
*Hernan Garcia, Governmental Affairs Liaison
They should have taken those huge grey rocks with them. You can break an ankle on those things
Years ago, they cut down a beautiful palm tree that was in the backyard of the apartment building I live in. They could have just trimmed it that time, too.
They cut down a mature tree at Hilldale and Santa Monica Blvd. on the west side of Hilldale (at the corner) -what a shame. And last year they came up Hilldale and butchered a whole row of mature trees. There has to be some oversight! Why can’t a city representative be on site when they are cutting these trees?!
OMG….the trees they butchered last year are the same ones they chopped down recently! That’s is unbelievable. What a total shame…and no notification to the neighborhood!
Kudos to Helen Collins and Lauren Meister for engaging productively with a concerned resident.
Agree.