With many Brookfield residents still hampered by tree issues from Tropical Storm Isaias, town officials gave a warning about using out of state tree removal companies.

Tree removal after a storm like we had can be a major problem for homeowners. That's why Brookfield town officials have issued a warning about any out of town company that comes to your home and is offering to clean things up for you.

At least one company is doing just that, and Brookfield's First Selectman, Steve Dunn, explained just what is going on:

"We've got at least one crew we believe is from Texas who has been going around town knocking on people's doors and offering to take trees down and do a clean-up. I have two problems with that, one, you have to have a permit in Brookfield to do that so that we can do a background check and make sure it's a legitimate company, and second, and even more concerning, is that these workers are coming from Texas where the COVID-19 is rampant, and I don't want them infecting our residents. We're trying to come up with a way that these guys can still do business, we've had our police out to talk with them and tell them they have to come in to Town Hall and get a permit, which usually takes three to four days. Then we're going to ask them to get COVID-19 tested before they start knocking on residents doors. The real problem in this day and age, is people don't want other people knocking on their doors especially when their not authorized by the town. We do set our permit fees fairly high to discourage this, and we usually only issue one or two permits per year for this type of local work".

So, if a tree service does come to your home, what should residents do?

"First, you should ask for an official permit from the Town of Brookfield, and if they are from an out of state service, ask them if they were COVID-19 tested. We have a lot of really good local services who can do this work, and probably do it for less money as well. When you hire local, you know their not going to disappear in a couple of weeks never to be heard from again".

If you do have an encounter with this company, or any company that does not produce an official town permit, please report them to the police department non-emergency line at 775 2575.

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