Hazardous tree removal in Black Forest Regional Park

BLACK FOREST, CO. -- There are still hundreds of trees stuggling to survive after last summer's black forest fire.

Now it's up to the county to remove hazardous trees that could put a park visitor in danger.

"There's some real hazardous trees that we want to take care of to ensure that the trail systrem is protected. They have a system in place to track it all, " said County Commissioner Darryl Glenn.

For the next six weeks crews will work in six zones throughout the park. With help from theU.S Forest ServiceandFEMAthe county has a set of criteria for what trees go down.

One of the criteria is the tree needs to be tall enough to fall onto a structure, road, or trail. Also, the truck of the tree has to have been scorched 50% of it's diameter.

In essence if the tree is dead or likely to die, it will be taken down.

El Paso County has hired Ceres Environmental to remove the trees.True North Emergency Managementwill oversee the work.

Glenn says the project is important for the safety of the comminity and as crews work he wants to remind the public to always be prepared and focus on mitigation.

It is all funded through a reimbursement. FEMA will reimburse the county for 75% of the costs. El Paso County will pay for the rest.

The work is expected to be done by April.

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Hazardous tree removal in Black Forest Regional Park