Gates Mayor Ron Carmickle is walking alongside a grove of burned trees off Highway 22 near his city in Oregon鈥檚 Santiam Canyon.
鈥淭he ones you can see here are marked,鈥� he said, pointing to a line of trees with blue spray paint on their trunks.
He鈥檚 brought two tree experts with him: arborist Rick Till and forest health specialist Dave Shaw with Oregon State University.
鈥淭hat one鈥檚 got pretty high scorch,鈥� Shaw said, pointing to one with blackened bark stretching more than halfway up the trunk and then moving on to another tree with less bark scorch. 鈥淭his one鈥檚 a little edgy.鈥�
The blue spray paint is how contractors with the Oregon Department of Transportation are marking what are deemed to be hazardous trees within areas that were burned in last year鈥檚 wildfires and need to be cut down for safety.
ODOT鈥檚 goal in the state鈥檚 ongoing hazard tree removal operation is to protect people from burned trees that could fall onto roads or buildings. But deciding which trees actually pose that risk is complicated, and a growing number of people say ODOT鈥檚 contractors are hastily marking too many trees for removal 鈥� including trees that aren鈥檛 actually hazardous.
The operation faces . Gov. Kate Brown has allowed the work to continue despite calls to stop the project and order an investigation, but , and critics like Carmickle are taking a closer look at the trees marked for removal.
He invited Till and Shaw to come check the state鈥檚 work by examining some of the trees with blue dots.
Shaw uses an axe to scrape away a thin layer of blackened bark on a Douglas fir tree that鈥檚 marked with a blue dot. Just under the surface, the bark is golden brown.
鈥淪ee how limited the char is?鈥� he said. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 not really severe bark char. It鈥檚 not really deep.鈥�
But the top of the tree doesn鈥檛 look very healthy, he said, so he wouldn鈥檛 challenge that removal decision. In contrast, Shaw points to another tree with a blue dot that has black bark but is full of green needles on top. That鈥檚 probably going to live, he said, so it doesn鈥檛 need to be cut down for safety.
鈥淭he crown is completely undamaged,鈥� he said. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 know. I鈥檓 suspicious about this tree. I mean, that one in particular doesn鈥檛 really look like a high likelihood of mortality.鈥�
Carmickle says that kind of conclusion adds to his concerns that ODOT contractors are over-cutting trees just to make more money. And he wants to stop them before they cut any more of the blue-dotted trees in his city.
鈥淚 mean, these trees are 60, 80 years old, it鈥檚 going to take that long for this to rejuvenate,鈥� he said. 鈥淪o that鈥檚 what we鈥檙e facing in this here. When they just clear-cut all this stuff out, we鈥檙e facing, you know, a whole generation before this ever comes back.鈥�
The mayor鈥檚 fears are compounded by firsthand reports from multiple people who worked on the state鈥檚 hazard tree removal project.
Eric Phillips is one of several whistleblowers who told lawmakers about the problems he saw while working for an ODOT contractor on Highway 224.
鈥淚t was a very 鈥楬urry up. Let鈥檚 get trees cut and cut as many trees as we can,鈥欌�� Phillips said in . 鈥淭here鈥檚 so much mismanagement. So much lack of accountability. It鈥檚 like people just want to get paid.鈥�
He said workers with no arborist experience were marking trees for removal that he saw contractors falling trees into wetlands and cutting trees that weren鈥檛 marked as hazardous, and that he didn鈥檛 see anyone making sure the rules were followed.
鈥淭here鈥檚 no oversight out there in the field at all,鈥� he said.
After the hearings, Sen. Jeff Golden and order an investigation.
鈥淲e鈥檇 better get real clear on what鈥檚 going on out there now, soon,鈥� the Ashland Democrat said. If we鈥檝e gone astray, if this project has gone astray, let鈥檚 find out and correct it right now.鈥�
He worries the state could lose federal disaster funding.
So far, ODOT and its contractors say they鈥檝e fixed many of the reported problems.
ODOT manager Mac Lynde told lawmakers to review the tree-cutting operation in response to the litany of complaints.
In , Lynde told the Senate Committee on Natural Resources and Wildfire Recovery that , president of Washington Forest Consultants, Inc. and an arborist with 30 years of experience in hazard tree identification.
鈥淲e鈥檙e up to 1,200 people on this project,鈥� Lynde told lawmakers. 鈥淚 have a high degree of confidence that it鈥檚 going well, but let鈥檚 face it. That鈥檚 a lot of people and a lot of moving parts. So, we鈥檙e asking him to come on and quite quickly, review the operation in several fire corridors.鈥�
Over the next three weeks, Lynde said, Wright will be reviewing the qualifications of the arborists and foresters working on the state project, the criteria being used to mark trees for removal and the overall process the state is using to mark and remove hazard trees.
鈥淗e won鈥檛 be looking at every single tree again or really every fire corridor, every mile we鈥檝e covered, but we鈥檙e asking him to look at a representative sample and confirm before the trees come down that it matches with the expectations of what our program is designed around,鈥� Lynde said. 鈥淲e hope this will build more confidence with others around our project. At minimum, I think it will validate some of the work that鈥檚 been going on or it will help inform additional changes.鈥�
Lynde said the Oregon Secretary of State will also be auditing the project, and that the state鈥檚 monitoring firm, CDR Maguire, has initiated its own internal review in response to the whistleblower allegations.
鈥淎s more information comes out about what those reviews identify, we鈥檒l certainly take swift action,鈥� Lynde said.
But environmental groups are still calling on the governor to stop the tree-cutting and by occupying a tree-removal site east of Eugene. ODOT has also reported some activists spray painting over the blue dots on marked trees to prevent falling crews from cutting them down.
At a rally in Salem last week, protesters dressed up in various costumes and chanted: 鈥淕overnor Brown, stop the cut!鈥�
ODOT and the governor say wildfire recovery is too important to stop the removal of hazardous trees. They want to make sure roads can reopen and homeowners can rebuild on their burned properties, and they say the state can continue to address the reported problems without stopping the project altogether.
Right now, the state is about a quarter of the way through marking and removing an estimated 140,000 hazard trees left by last year鈥檚 wildfires.
鈥淐ertainly our emergency response operation is an adaptive operation, and it looks a lot different today than when we started,鈥� Lynde told lawmakers on Monday. 鈥淭his is something that has never happened before in Oregon. Never has a program this size been launched. As we recover from these wildfires, we鈥檙e constantly refining our operation and learning from our experiences.鈥�
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