Official says debris problem piling up

• By SCOTT DYER
• Advocate staff writer
• Published: Dec 6, 2008 - Page: 1B - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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More than three months have passed since Hurricane Gustav hit East Baton Rouge Parish, but city-parish officials say that foreign fly-by-night tree cutters are still causing headaches for many local property owners.

Bob Hearn, a Department of Public Works engineer who is overseeing the cleanup of the storm debris, said unlicensed tree cutters from out of state are knocking on doors, offering to do work. The unscrupulous tree cutters falsely tell homeowners that the city-parish and its contractors will haul away the limbs and debris, and then leave the homeowners holding the bag.

“We’ve got them here from Canada, Florida, California, Maine, Wisconsin and all over the place — they’re called ‘storm chasers’ because that’s what they do for a living,” Hearn said.

“When a storm hits an area, that gravitate to it and try to work the debris — a lot of times they’re operating out of their trucks with cell phones,” Hearn said.

Many foreign tree cutters are not licensed and insured to work in Louisiana and don’t mind misleading people because they’ll never see them again, Hearn said.

“The bottom line is we don’t want people paying for a service that they’re not getting,” Hearn said.

Hearn said professional tree cutters are required by city-parish ordinances to haul away the debris that they create. Only debris that is created by a property owner is eligible for pickup under the city-parish’s contract with Allied Waste, he said.

Hearn said he gets calls from East Baton Rouge Parish property owners all the time that have been victimized by fly-by-night tree cutters.

“They (the tree cutters) knock on peoples doors, give them a price and tell them that the city-parish will pick up the stuff on their curb,” Hearn said.

Hearn said the city-parish’s debris contractor, Ceres Environmental, was picking up all Gustav-related debris after the storm, but that officially ended last month.

Ceres Environmental didn’t try to distinguish between woody waste created by homeowners and that created by tree cutters, but those cleanup efforts ended last month.

Since then, Hearn said he’s received a steady stream of complaints from the city’s garbage and trash hauler, Allied Waste, about woody waste that is in such large chunks that it could only be generated by professional tree cutters.

In those cases, Hearn said he notifies the property owners that they will have to make their own arrangements to have the debris hauled off — and that means more expense for the property owners.