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Holiday 2003 THETHE AASPLSPLUNDHUNDH TREETREE Merit Awards THETHE AASPLSPLUNDHUNDH With the holiday season TREETREE upon us, let’s take a moment to congratulate some awesome Holiday Issue 2003 Asplundh crews whose good deeds earned them Silver Merit Contents Awards. They are probably at Hurricane Isabel Generates the top of Santa’s gift list, too! Huge Storm Response ................................ 2 In the photo at right, Vice Storm Work Before and After Isabel .............. 4 President Doug Gober (far R) Asplundh Railroad Division met up with General Foreman Ventures into Mexico ................................. 5 Rick Nordyke (second from R) Anniversary Celebrations Abound.................. 6 on November 10 to present him Retirement Honors & In Memoriam............... 8 and the crew of (L to R) Daniel Hoskins, Willy Lake, Crew Leader Joe Benavidez Management Update ...................................... 10 and Kevin Sowash with Asplundh Corporate Silver Merit Awards. On the morning Orchids ........................................................... 13 of September 10 in Alsip, Illinois, this righteous group of men risked serious injury to Service Anniversaries..................................... 19 rescue a ComEd meter reader from a man who was attacking him with a baseball bat. Crews & News .............................................. 21 According to ComEd Meter Reading Supervisor Joe Tantillo, the crew was preparing to trim trees next door when they spotted the attack. Immediately they went to the aid of There’s More to NADF Than Arbor Day..... 29 the meter reader and called the Alsip Police Department, who arrested the attacker. Safety Success Is No Accident ..................... 30 Award Winning Images “The meter reader received a small contusion to the lower part of his right eye,” from Shoot Out 2003..................................... 32 wrote Mr. Tantillo in a thank-you note recognizing the crew’s swift and heroic actions. “I believe if it were not for Rick and his crew, this situation could have become more serious.” We believe it, too! Good job, guys! On the Cover In the photo at left, These three gobblers managed to escape the Supervisor Randy Parham Thanksgiving table and ended up on our Holiday magazine cover! Wild turkeys are on the come- (far R) of the Steve Bostock back trail thanks to public/private/commercial Region in Alabama joined partnerships developed by the National Wild with General Foreman Turkey Federation. (photo courtesy of National Richard Hinds (far L) to Wild Turkey Federation / www.NWTF.org) congratulate Asplundh Silver Merit Award Winners (center Managing Editor L and R) Crew Member Corporate Communications Michael Street and Foreman Patti Chipman Shane Bivins for their part Writer/Editor in putting out a brush fire on Kristin Wild February 24. On that day, they were working for Cullman Electric Cooperative along County Road Editorial Assistant Ronnie Gauker 53. They noticed a neighbor’s brush fire getting out of control. After calling the local fire company, the crew used their truck’s fire extinguisher, rakes and their own feet to put out the fire. Even before the fire truck arrived, they had the fire under control and they thought The Asplundh Tree is a family magazine, that was that. However, the next day, Foreman Harlan Baker (L in photo below) and published quarterly for all employees and friends of the Asplundh companies. Crew Member Jason Sterling (center, below) were working in the vicinity and the same brush fire flared up once again. Asplundh welcomes requests to reprint or otherwise duplicate this magazine, in whole or The fire department was called in in part. Please contact the Managing Editor of and the two men joined in with Corporate Communications at the address below the fire workers to drag the hoses for permission, or call 1-800-248-TREE (in the off the truck and put the fire out, U.S. or Canada). for good! ©2003 Asplundh Tree Expert Co. Mrs. Laurie Roden of Cullman wrote a thank-you e-mail saying, “All of their help was highly appreciated by the Asplundh Tree Expert Co. Cold Springs Fire Dept., as well 708 Blair Mill Road, Willow Grove, PA 19090 as all of us from the community!” www.asplundh.com We appreciate your work, too! Printed on recycled paper HappyHappy Holidays!Holidays! This has been a historic year for our company—our 75th focus on vegetation management programs and the electrical yearT in business—still family-owned and operated. Very few infrastructure throughout North America. Then, in September, companies can claim this, and still fewer have reached the our size. Hurricane Isabel was a real focal point for us and we shined when Our history is one of commitment, focus and hard work. We over 5,000 employees from several of our companies worked have had our ups and downs, but we have always managed to thousands of man-hours to help our customers restore service. succeed in the long run. Our founders witnessed the electrification Vegetation management will always be important to us, our of a nation and watched this country grow into an industrial giant. customers, the people we work with, and the public. For 75 years They endured economic depressions and world wars. Our company’s we have been tree trimmers and we’re proud of it! traditions were set by their commitment to the utility industry Asplundh and its subsidiary companies benefited from the and a faith that the services we provide would bring value to our better economy in 2003, a renewed focus on reliability, and the customers, employees and the public. continuation of outsourcing. Our industry insists that projects be An example of that faith and commitment is the fact that even done on time, on budget, and safely. Our performance on these today, 75 years later, three of the six original companies that got counts make us the contractor of choice and our extensive list of Asplundh into this business remain as our customers today. sole-source contracts proves it. We often talk of the good old days. Think of the men and We would like to express our appreciation to our customers women who were there before us—the storms they fought, the who have supported our efforts and from whom we have learned budget cuts they endured, the equipment they had or did not have. so much. After all, this group showed us the management styles Over the years we have seen the mechanization of our industry, that work, and those that don’t. Our country has the most reliable and with this, the large investment necessary today to do the work and least expensive electric energy in the world. To work for a efficiently. In the 1930s, it cost $400 to equip and field a tree successful industry such as this, our company had better be good! crew. Today, it is well over $100,000. We would also like to thank our employees, from vice presidents We need to remember those good old days, but look ahead at to ground personnel. By doing more than just your job, by going how we can make things the extra mile, by setting a good example and giving better. I bet there were some Company Founders’ Portraits people back in the 1950s who fellow employees a chance thought that this industry had Carl Asplundh Lester Asplundh Griffith Asplundh to move forward, you have gone as far as it could go. forged the way for this Boy, were they wrong! And company to succeed. Finally, we’ll be wrong, too, if we our families also deserve don't understand that new our gratitude for supporting ideas and methods are out us as we worked so hard there and that changes will at Asplundh. continue to take place. 2003 was a very active The tree-initiated blackout year, and I’m sure next year of over 50 million people in will be also. We hope you the Northeast and Canada in and your families have a August brought a whole new wonderful holiday and may 2004 be your best year ever. Christopher B. Asplundh Scott M. Asplundh Chief Executive Officer President The Asplundh TREE 1 Holiday Issue 2003 Hurricane Isabel Generates Huge Storm Response W The flooding and winds caused by Weather forecasters gave plenty of Hurricane Isabel tore this sailboat from its warnings about the potential destruction to be Chesapeake Bay mooring and it drifted into a Conectiv 69kV transmission line that caused by Hurricane Isabel. While thousands was normally on dry land. From North of people were evacuated from shoreline Carolina to New England, tree-caused areas, utilities from North Carolina to New outages cut the power to about six million England braced for the worst—and the homes and businesses. Virginia, Maryland worst came on September 18th. and Washington, D.C. were hit hardest. When all was said and done, Asplundh had mobilized approximately 900 crews to assist in power restoration and clean-up. And it’s not over yet! The Tom McDonnell Region in Virginia is scheduled to have X Vice President Steve Miller sent in this photo of outside crews remain until the end of the year. hundreds of Asplundh crews gathered at a Conectiv staging area outside of Wilmington, Delaware. On the Prior to the storm, Asplundh helped 11 Delmarva Peninsula alone, more than 440 employees utilities from Virginia to New York prepare from eight Asplundh management regions joined up by mobilizing more than 500 Asplundh tree with over 300 local workers from the Steve Miller crews and putting them into place the day Region to help Conectiv restore power. Outside crews before. Then Isabel cut its broad swath were also called in to assist Choptank Electric in through the populous Middle Atlantic states Maryland as well as Delaware Electric Cooperative and the City of Dover Electric Department.