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Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/94460
Partners Updates Utility Arborists Association Utility Arborist Snapshot: Mark Frizzell of Sacramento, CA care professionals prepare to successfully take the Certified Arborist exam. Fifty-plus people have used the eight-week course as a spring- board to become Certified Arborists. For the past 15 years, Mark has taught classes in Sacramento to help tree Mark's brother, Randall Frizzell, was his inspi- ration and reason for entering the tree care industry. He taught Mark what a high calling it was to care for trees and the people they come in contact with. After working for several years with his brother Randall in the tree care busi- ness in the late 70s and early 80s, Mark took an apprentice tree worker job with Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) in 1984. Over the next 27 years he served with them in the capacity of Journeyman Tree Worker, Tree Crew Foreman, Tree Crew Supervisor, and the last 10 years as Superintendent of the Vegetation Management group. Mark says, "SMUD is a fantastic company for a person who loves trees. They always do whatever it takes to be on the cutting edge of the best utility arboriculture practices in the country." Mark retired from SMUD in the 2011 and is again working for his brother Randall in the arboriculture field with Randall Frizzell and Associates. Mark also thanks the UAA's Steve Hallmark and Nelsen Money who, he says, "showed me how much I had to learn about modern utility arboriculture and were a constant source of input and feedback." Mark has always thought that his greatest challenge was also the thing most rewarding to him: building partnerships. Mark's profes- sional life has been highlighted by the partner- ships and relationships developed with groups like the city tree departments of Sacramento and Folsom, Sacramento Tree Foundation, U.S. Forest Service, California State Parks, Sacramento County Parks, Cal Fire, Cosumnes River Preserve and many others. 28 "Par tnerships between utility and municipal arborists are critical to our urban forests today," Frizzell says. "In a mid-size utility like SMUD (with only 900 square miles of territory) we had an inventory of nearly 200,000 trees. The municipal arborists in our community played an impor tant role in how SMUD strategized the maintenance of those trees." In his free time, he enjoys family, helping people with their trees, hiking, reading, road trips, and teaching. Mark serves on the UAA Education Committee. Mark reminds col- leagues, "Don't forget to have www.utilityar- borist.org in your 'Favorites' list. It is filled with tree/utility related materials and resourc- es and is truly a must for the serious utility arborist and tree professional." City Trees