NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — According to City of Hutchinson Parks and Facilities Director Justin Combs, the city is looking to help those on the south side of town with knowing if their trees are viable or not.
"We received a quarter million dollar grant from the U.S. Forest Service for tree removal south of 11th," Combs told the City Council last week. "We have five years to spend the money, so we are going to evaluate where we have our highest pockets of dead trees and then come up with a process to get those eliminated."
The intent is to let the current conditions stand for the moment while they do the overall study.
"We also know that we do have dead trees right now that we're getting complaints on south of 11th," Combs said. "We're being very cautious that, when we get those complaints about a dead tree that is the responsibility of the homeowner, we're not going to push the issue with that homeowner right now. I'd hate for us to force a homeowner to remove a tree and then a year later, remove their neighbor's tree that's dead, using grant funding."
It isn't clear yet what the most efficient use of the dollars will turn out to be.
"I don't have all the details of how we'll use that funding at this point," Combs said. "We're going to spend this spring evaluating all the dead trees, basically everything south of 11th, so we can come up with a plan," Combs said. "Do we do it a couple years at a time and do small blocks? Do we just hire one big contractor and do it all at one time? We're going to be very systematic and very intentional about how we spend that funding. We've had the funding for a little while. It's a great grant. Jeremy Lindahl, Superintendent of Horticulture and Forestry, actually wrote the grant."
The City was encouraged by the Kansas Forest Service to apply for the funds.
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