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It might not feel like it for people who have debris piled on their tree belt since the Oct. 29-30 snowstorm, but cities and towns throughout the Pioneer Valley are racing against the clock to clear the roadsides.

“We are trying to get the streets cleaned up before the snow starts,” said Sean Kelley, director of special projects for the East Longmeadow Department of Public Works.

Belchertown Fire Chief Edward Bock told his town’s selectmen last week that there were many roads in town with debris from the Oct. 29-30 snowstorm piled high enough to make it difficult to see children walking to school.

And Belchertown Selectman George D. Archible joined the conversation, saying, “Anywhere you walk in this town, there is a (hanging limb) on top of you.”

It is the same situation in cities and towns along the Pioneer Valley from Vermont to Connecticut.

Much of the wet, heavy snow that came down Oct. 29-30 landed on trees that were still full of leaves and the weight of it all took down limbs and trees, which in turn took down electrical power lines.

It took several days to a week before power was restored in much of Western Massachusetts.

When the snow stopped, leaders of many communities told residents to move the downed limbs and other debris to the edge of the road where they would be picked up for disposal.

President Obama has declared an emergency related to the October storm, so towns and cities are going about hiring contractors for the debris removal with an expectation that the Federal Emergency Management Agency will reimburse the communities for 75 percent of the costs of safety related work.

Many of the cities and towns have hired Ashbritt Inc. of Florida to handle their debris removal.

Ware Public Works Director Thomas J. Martens said Ashbritt was hired in his town because the company is the only one on a Massachusetts list of companies that can be hired without going through a bidding process.

The alternative, Martens said, would be a bidding process that could easily take a month or more.

“That is a little bit prohibitive,” Martens said.

Martens said Ashbritt is familiar with FEMA regulations and requirements related to being paid by the federal agency and is also familiar with what has to be done.

“They do the work, basically, a cradle to the grave operation, they pick up, haul, grind it and remove it for disposal,” Martens said. “The state set it up that way. “

Most communities that hire Ashbritt are also hiring O’Brien’s Response Management, Inc., of Florida, which monitors all the Ashbritt work and compiles detailed reports on every aspect of what is done by each crew, each day.

Longmeadow Department of Public Works Director Michael G. Wrabel said the storm was devastating to the landscape of the town.

“We are known for having many big old trees and a lot of those came down,” he said. “We also had a lot of smaller trees and utility polls that came down as well.”

Wrabel said the Department of Public Works and several private contractors are making the rounds through each neighborhood picking up debris on the tree belts.

He said they will make a second and third trip around town to make sure everything is collected.

All of the brush and debris is being transported to a field on Wolf Swamp Road across from the Twin Hills Country Club. The debris is put through a wood chipper and then will then be sent to wood burning plants or sold as mulch, Wrabel said.

Wrabel said the damage could cost the town upwards of $12 million.

“We won’t be done with this cleanup for quite a while,” he said.

In East Longmeadow residents are being asked to have their debris on the tree belt before Nov. 27.

East Longmeadow residents are also encouraged to drop off their debris to the transfer station on Somers Road or 380 Chestnut St., the former Package Machinery, where they have a staging area. They have collected about 15,000 cubic yards of debris, Kelley said.

Kelley said the town hired local contractor Rocky Mountain Wood Co. in Wilbraham to haul away the debris.

He said he is expecting costs from the storm to be between $250,000 and $500,000.

“We were able to save some money buy doing a lot of the work ourselves and hiring a local contractor,” Kelley said.

In Agawam on Wednesday night, the City Council authorized spending $2,350,000 to clean up trees and branches downed by the storm. The city has contracted with AshBritt Inc. to pick up the debris, which property owners may leave at curbside. Mayor Richard A. Cohen said it should take two to three weeks to clear away all the material with collection taking place seven days a week. AshBritt is bringing the material to city land at the Tuckahoe Turf Farm, where it is ground and then taken away. As far as any danger of forest fires, Cohen said he does not believe that will be a problem.

In West Springfield, Mayor Edward J. Gibson said the city has hired AshBritt Inc. to clear away the tree and brush debris people have gathered at curbside. As of Thursday, he said the bill to the city came to $2.5 million for disposing of 90,000 cubic yards of material.

Gibson said he will likely tap the city’s stabilization fund and use free cash to pay for the cleanup.

The mayor said he is hopeful the federal government will declare a national disaster so the city will be eligible to have FEMA pay 75 percent of the costs.

Director of Public Works Jack Dowd said he is hopeful the total cost will be below the $4 million originally estimated for the cleanup. The materials are taken to the city’s transfer station off Agawam Avenue, where they are ground up to be used for mulch.

If there is no snow or bad weather, Gibson said the city is on track to have all the mess from the snowstorm cleaned up by Dec. 15. As for whether the material will pose a fire hazard, Gibson said that might be a possibility if it is still uncollected in the spring.

The city has no more debris on public land from the June 1 tornado, according to Gibson.

In Springfield, the city has hired Ashbritt to oversee the task of removing all tree debris from the storm. Ashbritt, which also assisted the city with the tornado cleanup, is hiring private subcontractors for the task.

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The tree debris is being taken to Cathedral High School where it is mulched and delivered to various sites.

“The city hopes to have all tree debris cleared before additional winter snow arrives but recognizes this will be a lengthy tree debris removal process due to the massive amount of tree debris,” said Thomas T. Walsh, communications director for the city of Springfield.

The city has been making “steady progress” since the snowstorm, and has thus far removed 250,000 cubic yards of tree debris, as of mid-week, Walsh said.

"To put this massive amount of debris into perspective, the city collected 160,000 cubic yards of tree debris following the June 1 tornado," Walsh said.

The cost of the cleanup is not yet known, but reimbursements are being pursued from FEMA.

Residents are asked to drag their branches to the tree belt or to the edge of their properties if there is not tree belt.

In addition, there is a parking advisory in effect, that asks residents not to block the tree debris with parked cars. If the debris is blocked, it cannot be reached by the work crews, and the pickup will be delayed to a later date, Walsh said.

The work crews and large debris removal trucks are in all neighborhoods, Walsh said.

Contractors who are hired by residents for tree work are responsible for their own debris.

The city is continuing to work with FEMA and other agencies to seek reimbursement for cleanup costs related to the June 1 tornado and Oct. 29 snowstorm, Walsh said.

Some subcontractors hired by Ashbritt are still removing branches from public trees and placing them on the tree belt temporarily until the large trucks remove them, Walsh said.

Wilbraham Selectman Patrick J. Brady said the town has contracted with Rocky Mountain Wood Co. on Boston Road to clean up the debris from town tree belts. The debris is being taken to the company’s site on Boston Road and being mulched, he said. Town residents have been invited to bring the debris from their yards which is not on the tree belt to the town’s Disposal and Recycling Center where there is no charge to get rid of the debris.

“Residents are coming in pickup trucks, trailers, SUVs, anything that has wheels,” Brady said. “We’ve seen rental trucks from Home Depot and UHaul,” he said. He said it is less expensive for people to dispose of their own yard waste than to contract with somebody to dispose of it. Brady said the town’s goal has been to get as much of the storm debris as possible cleaned up by Thanksgiving. In Holyoke, the Department of Public Works received approval from the City Council and state Department of Revenue for deficit spending to get piles of branches and tree debris collected around the city, department Superintendent William D. Fuqua said.

He expects the city will have spent $1 million on the collection when the effort is done in three to four weeks, he said.

“It’s going really well,” Fuqua said.

To help with the tree debris collection, Fuqua asked that drivers who must use on-street parking avoid parking vehicles in front of the piles because that hinders trucks’ access.

The permission to deficit-spend is contingent on the department later paying for the collection costs by the end of the fiscal year, which is June 30. That probably will be done with either a transfer from the city free cash account or borrowing, he said.

The effort involves two types of independent-contractor crews working in the city. A dozen bucket trucks are canvassing the city and knocking down tree branches threatening to power lines. That step is nearly done, he said.

A half-dozen other contractors in large trucks are collecting the tree debris. It will be delivered to a temporary work space, set up near the former Mount Tom ski area now owned by the Holyoke Boys and Girls Club Inc., where it will be ground into mulch. That step is about half done, he said.

A big help in the effort has been the opportunity to tap into a state vendor program that made such contractors available to the city. The program through the Operational Services Division was helpful because it gave the city access to contractors that otherwise might have been unavailable given the number of communities needing such services, he said.

Chicopee Department of Public Works has cut down about 600 hanging limbs as a preventative measure and have covered between one-third and one-half of the city so far, Stanley W. Kulig, superintendent of public works, said.

The Department has also directed people to put their tree branches on the tree belt or near the road and they will pick them up and bring them to the city’s garage where they will be chipped and used for things like landfill coverings, he said.

The department expects to finish its first pass through the city this weekend and will start making a second pass immediately so they can pick up as much brush as possible before it starts to snow, Kulig said.

Employees will work the Thanksgiving weekend so residents are told they can continue putting out their brush.

Already the City Council approved spending an additional about $1 million on the storm and believe the costs will go as high as $3 million. It is planning to apply to the Federal Emergency Management Agency in the hopes of getting 75 percent of the costs reimbursed.

Edward Huntley, public works director in Northampton, said, “we’re moving as fast as we can.” They have four crews out and will assist with a neighborhood cleanup on Saturday. He expects to have the city cleaned before the snow flies. A second city-wide neighborhood cleanup has been set for this Saturday.

In Amherst, town public works crews continue to pick up public shade tree debris with daily postings of where crews are each day on the town’s Web site. The Town is not collecting debris from private property. Any tree debris placed on the side of the road from private trees will not be collected. Residents can take private tree debris for disposal at the transfer station for a disposal cost of $50 per ton. Residents do not need a transfer station access sticker to dispose of wood debris from the storm.

In Palmer, storm-related debris pick-up began on Monday and is expected to be completed by Thanksgiving. Residents can put their debris within 10 feet of the roadway. Officials said it cannot be placed in the roadway, or on the sidewalk.

Palmer, like neighboring Monson, has contracted with Ashbritt Environmental to do the clean-up and O’Brien’s Response Management, which is responsible for monitoring the work.

Palmer Interim Town Manager Charles T. Blanchard said the cost of the cleanup is estimated at approximately $1 million; Ashbritt estimates there is 20,000 cubic yards of debris to pick up. It will be brought to the leaf pit on Old Warren Road where the company will chip it and take it away, he said. Blanchard is hoping the town receives 75 percent reimbursement from the Federal Emergency Management Agency toward the cleanup cost; officials have met with FEMA representatives about the damage.

Palmer and Monson already have qualified for FEMA funding for the first 70 hours related to the storm response, officials said.

In Monson, Highway Surveyor John R. Morrell said Ashbritt is only picking up debris on public property. He said residents are responsible for the debris on their own property, and need to hire a private contractor to haul it away. The town is not picking up debris from private property because it still has outstanding costs from the tornado, he said.

He estimated that there is approximately 20,000 cubic yards of debris on public ways in Monson; Ashbritt is bringing it to a staging area on Main Street where it will be chipped and taken away. Morrell said the pick-up, which began Monday, should end by Dec. 10.Monson already had lost numerous trees to the June 1 tornado. That area of town fared better than others during the snowstorm because of the lack of trees, officials said.

Monson also is seeking help from FEMA for the pre-Halloween storm.

Ashbritt and O’Brien’s worked in Monson after the tornado to clear the damaged areas.

Staff reporters Elizabeth Roman, Peter Goonan, Lori Stabile, Mike Plaisance, Suzanne McLaughlin, Sandy Constantine, Jeanette Deforge and Ted Laborde contributed to this story.