A Legislative Fly In meeting in Washington D.C. (L-R) Bill Weber, ArborWear; Steve Marshall, Davey; Daniel Van Starrenburg, SavATree; Anne Garvin; Mark Garvin; U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy; Andy Felix, Tree Tech; Ben Tresselt, Arborist Enterprises.
for the tree care company hiring them to provide housing if they want them to prosper and return repeatedly. “Many of our companies have pur- chased a house and put people up, or purchased apartments or condos,” Garvin explains.
As it stands now, it takes a fair amount of time, paperwork, and funding to se- cure foreign workers. For companies that have a shortage of these resourc- es, recruiting locally and training indi- viduals new to the industry from the ground up is their best option. STIFF COMPETITION When it comes to recruiting teenagers into the workforce, competition can be fierce. Aer all, the tree care industry is much more labor-intensive than the typical first-time job. However, the benefit of training younger workers can be pivotal for the tree care industry. With fast-food restaurant wag- es rising in California upwards of $20 per hour, a tree care company has to of- fer more – benefits, advancements, and potential for growth in the company. “You need to make it attractive for those people to come in the door,” says Garvin. HOW TO GET STARTED? While there’s not one path to enter the
dustry was synonymous with loggers and should be covered by the logging standard, which is completely inappro- priate, Garvin says. “The methods we use, the equipment we use, and how we go about work are not the same as logging,” he adds. Despite asking OSHA for a tree care standard (and to stop citing the in- dustry under the logging standard), tree care has been waiting for its own standard for more than 25 years now. There have been times when OSHA has agreed to write a tree care standard, however, it has yet to come to fruition. The other issue is foreign labor and get- ting legal workers by using H-2B visas for temporary non-agricultural work- ers, along with other available visas. “Unfortunately, too many companies in our industry use illegal workers,” Garvin says. The H-2B visas are seasonal, although you can bring workers back year aer year for nine months at a time. Since workers from other countries have no place to live in the U.S., it makes sense
Directing crews at the NAA's National Day of Service at Arlington National Cemetery in 1998.
60 | ArborTIMES Summer 2024
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