A council has agreed a contract that will see them spend nearly £2.2m on tree care over the next four years.
The deal agreed by Somerset Council includes funding for ongoing efforts to combat ash dieback, which is a fungal disease that has wiped out thousands of ash trees in the UK since it arrived in 2012.
The Mendip and Quantock hills in Somerset are some of the areas that have been particularly effected by the spread of the disease.
Councils have a legal duty to ensure that trees under their care are safe. Paul Sweetman, the council’s service manager for highway risk, said “this necessitates a proactive programme of felling and management to mitigate the risk of tree failure”.
Mr Sweetman said the Chalara fungus, which causes ash dieback, “is now widespread across Somerset”, reported the Local Democracy Reporting Service.
He said the spread had led to the “rapid decline and death of a significant proportion of the county’s ash trees”.
The council has not publicly identified the chosen contractors for the work citing commercial sensitivity.
Mr Sweetman said it would not prove cost-effective to taxpayers to deliver these services entirely in-house, due to the fluctuating demand for the service over the course of a given year.
The council has estimated the costs of any works, which will include tree felling and routine work such as storm damage clearance and care for other types of tree, at about £675,000 per year.
