How Arborcraft's risk assessments keep Victorian school sites safe

The Challenge

Every tree on a school site is a risk someone has to answer for. Programmed runs Make Safe contracts for Victorian state schools: emergency work, often driven by events like severe weather. Sometimes a tree has come down. Just as often it is a tree that might, and the school needs to understand the risk before anyone decides what to do.

A school is not a simple site. Parents, the school, the minister's office and politicians all take an interest, so the response has to be quick and safe. As Sean Balchin, Contract Manager at Programmed, puts it, that takes "a little bit of empathy and understanding of where the schools are at."

It also takes judgement. Regional schools love their trees and the shade they give students, so removal is not always the answer. And the reporting behind every job is, in Sean's words, among the most demanding he has run.

Project details:

• Client: Programmed
• Contract: Make Safe, Victorian state school sites
• Relationship: Seven years
• Services: Tree risk assessment, arborist reporting, emergency make safe works

Assess, report, then act

When a request comes in from Programmed, Arborcraft's arborists attend, assess the risk and report back so Programmed can make the call. Execution follows from that assessment. Arborcraft works to a four-hour attendance target statewide.

Sometimes the answer is an arborist report that spells out the risk in a particular tree. Sometimes it is de-weighting a top-heavy tree rather than removing it. Either way, "we'll generally go off the recommendations that Arborcraft put forward," Sean says. On the ground, "they know the pressures that we're under from a make safe perspective. They understand our KPIs. When we ask them to jump, they generally do."

Speed is built into how Arborcraft runs, not treated as a special case. An on-call roster covers the business around the clock, on-call staff keep a packed go-bag ready so no time is lost, and office staff know their role in an emergency without being told. "We all run towards the fire," says Managing Director Sam Pusey. Every job comes with a report at the time and an outcome report back to Programmed, fed into a compliance-ready platform.

Sean rates the quality of those reports as "always spot on," and says Arborcraft is the one ringing him to check he is happy with them. He also points to Sam's investment in the business: "I've seen Sam in particular investing a lot in his business, getting the right equipment to be able to do the job safely."

The 2022 wind event: Arborcraft steps up

In 2022, a major wind event brought down more than 150 trees, with over 40 schools reporting tree issues. Arborcraft immediately made the contract the priority. Every school they attended was made safe first, with bunting or fencing around fallen trees, then works were triaged and scheduled across the sites that needed them.

Six or seven schools were major. At one school in Gisborne, a fallen tree roughly two metres across at the base needed heavy haulage trucks on an oval, just as floods hit. It had to be lifted out without damaging buildings or the oval. "They absolutely did not drop the ball on that," Sean says.

It was a turning point. Sean told Sam that Programmed would pull back from engaging arborists through multi-trade contractors and rely on Arborcraft across the state. Seven years in, he says every interaction leaves him feeling "like I'm the most important client they've got."

Key outcomes:

• Seven years on the Make Safe contract, and Programmed's go-to arborist across Victorian schools
• Winner of Programmed's Vendor of the Quarter Award (2022), ranking first among 500 vendors across Victoria, New South Wales and Tasmania
• 150+ trees down and 40+ schools affected in 2022: sites made safe on attendance, works triaged and delivered
• No safety issue in the relationship, from a contract manager who deals with over 30 contractors