Since 2003, when a fallen tree limb in northern Summit County triggered a massive power failure in the United States and Canada, FirstEnergy Corp. has trimmed and leveled trees in its way with an almost religious fervor.

Rudy Mahdinec of Broadview Heights and Barbara Bruck of Lyndhurst say they understand that trees can cause power failures. They also know utilities have an obligation to make sure history doesn’t repeat itself.

But they are infuriated with the aggressive approach being taken.

Mahdinec’s back yard abuts Interstate 77. Flowering crab apple trees were barriers to highway noise and westerly winds that drove snow at the back of his home. Unfortunately, the back yard also lies below FirstEnergy’s electric transmission lines.

The steelworker returned to his home on Millwood Drive one day about three years ago, and the trees were gone. All of them. Only a rusting highway fence remained.

Bruck remembers a day in November 2003 when crews hired by the Cleveland Electric Illuminating Co. (a FirstEnergy company) showed up to trim around distribution lines that run between back yards on Clubside and Middledale roads.

Bruck, who said she suffers from a rare and fatal form of muscular dystrophy, sleeps in a ground-floor bedroom with a large window that overlooks her green “sanctuary.”

She said she was unable to do anything when Texas tree trimmers began cutting down the trees, branches and underbrush — the nature that formed a wall of green.

“I crawled out of my bed and was pounding on my windows,” she said.

The back yards of Bruck and Mahdinec offer a glimpse of a democratic clash between what is good for society and what offends a homeowner.

If you’ve got a tree in

our way, it comes down’

FirstEnergy Vice President Ralph DiNicola said his company walks a fine line between the need to ensure that power is not interrupted and the sensitivities of homeowners.

The company was sharply criticized in a report on the 2003 blackout for failing to adequately trim trees in power-line rights-of-way.

FirstEnergy’s response was the aggressive program it now follows.

DiNicola said stories like those told by Bruck and Mahdinec give his company an opportunity to warn customers about the oil-and-water relationship between trees and electric lines.

“Don’t plant anything beneath the wires,” he said. Trees are banned from beneath transmission lines. Period.

“It doesn’t matter who you know. Your situation in life doesn’t matter,” DiNicola said. “If you’ve got a tree in our way, it comes down.”

Bruck and her husband, Dr. Allen M. Segal, moved from Shaker Heights to the home on Clubside in 2003.

“My back yard means everything to me,” Bruck said. “It’s my sanctuary. I love nature. That’s why we bought this house.”

Couple seek legislation

to regulate trimming

Segal and Bruck have lobbied state legislators for a bill to create a watchdog agency to regulate tree trimming by electrical companies. Whatever might come of their efforts would be too late for them in the short term, for their back yards are to be trimmed again this month. But they are getting help anyway.

On May 20, while Bruck was out of town with her husband seeking medical treatment, representatives from the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio, CEI and State Rep. Josh Mandel’s office viewed the property to determine what work was needed. They reached an agreement to allow Bruck and Segal to pick a tree-trimming firm to handle the job.

They may even appreciate the work done at their homes this year, but it could come at a cost anyway.

Rick Reese, an attorney for the Ohio Office of Consumers’ Counsel, said power companies can seek rate increases to cover the cost of doing business — including tree trimming.

Reese said that means people like Bruck, Segal and Mahdinec may pay more for electricity because of tree trimmers that cut down back-yard sanctuaries and crab apple trees.