Tree's downing raises ire of stunned Beach couple

VIRGINIA BEACH

Once, there was a very big, old magnolia tree in Marie and Jeff Hamlin's backyard. Dominion Virginia Power cut it down two weeks ago.

The Hamlins are furious. They said the tree could have been trimmed, not whacked to the ground, and they didn't get enough warning.

Dominion said the tree was a danger to high-voltage overhead transmission lines, and the Hamlins had plenty of notice.

In the end, it was a judgment call - one that Dominion makes every day, thousands of times a year. No matter how many times the two sides make their cases, the impasse is irreconcilable.

The Hamlins insist the tree, which they estimate was 60 years old, could have been saved.

Dominion insists it could not.

"I just don't understand why they would kill something that stood for so long," Marie Hamlin said. She believes a contractor mistakenly tore down the tree.

It was no mistake, said Charles Penn, a Dominion spokesman.

"As you can imagine, it's always a very sensitive area when you start trimming trees in a residential area," Penn said. "We're always walking a tightrope between having respect for people and their property and trying to make sure trees don't cause outages. And they do."

The incident began Feb. 26.

That day, the Hamlins came home from work to find a notice on their front door. It was from Dominion - a "Tree Trim Notice."

"Sorry we missed you," it said. "We are in the process of clearing dangerous trees, cutting brush, and trimming trees on the high-voltage transmission line located in your neighborhood... Contract tree crews will be cutting trees in areas that threaten the electric lines as directed by our foresters."

The Hamlins were not worried. They have lived in the house at 348 Citation Drive in Kempsville for 12 years. Dominion had trimmed the tree three times before.

It was a very large magnolia tree - about 25 or 30 feet wide. The trunk was almost 5 feet in diameter.

"It's a fairly significant tree," said Oscar Richardson, an expert hired by the Hamlins to study the tree. "It does have some age on it." He would not estimate the tree's age until he could study its rings.

Directly above the tree was a high-voltage electrical transmission line. Dominion said the tree was about 30 feet tall, and the power lines were 35 feet high.

The Hamlins were confident the tree would be trimmed back, as usual. When they arrived home from work the next day, they were stunned to see the tree was gone. In its place was a pile of fat logs.

"To be told in advance would be better than coming home to this," Marie Hamlin said.

Penn, the Dominion spokesman, said the power company had no choice. He said Dominion is more aggressive about protecting power lines since Hurricane Isabel and the East Coast blackout, both in 2003.

Penn said Dominion's guidelines are clear: If a tree would fall within 10 feet of a power line, it must be taken down. That's especially true if the tree is near a major transmission line, which can carry up to 230,000 volts.

Dominion cuts tens of thousands of trees every three years, Penn said. He had no figures on how many are trimmed and how many are cut down.

As for the Hamlins' magnolia, "That tree had to be taken out," Penn said. "We apologize for it, but that tree was right in the middle of the transmission line."

The Hamlins are not convinced. If the tree was 5 feet below the power line, Jeff Hamlin asked, "What was it going to do? Jump up when it falls over?"

The Hamlins said they might have accepted the cutting if Dominion had told them in advance, explicitly, instead of leaving the ambiguous notice.

"We'd be upset," Jeff Hamlin said. "But we'd be resigned."

Marc Davis, (757) 222-5131, marc.davis@pilotonline.com