Standing the Test of Time: James Wilson
Standing the Test of Time: James Wilson
July 2023 marked ACRT Pacific Pre-Inspection Manager James Wilson’s 24th anniversary with the organization.
The England native moved to the United States in 1992, where he first discovered the “little, niche field” of utility vegetation management. After working for one of our competitors for a handful of years, Wilson joined ACRT Pacific and has been rooted in the Bay Area ever since.
Throughout his time with the organization, Wilson has progressed from a consulting utility forester/inspector to a senior consulting utility forester, and now, a pre-inspection manager. He’s also an International Society of Arboriculture (ISA) Certified Arborist Utility Specialist® and holds the ISA Tree Risk Assessment Qualification (TRAQ) credential.
Wilson recalls ACRT Pacific winning our customer’s transmission contract for the Bay Area in 2007 and says that the transmission inspection side of the industry has been his focus for the last 16-some years.
“When we first got the transmission contract, we didn’t really know how the transmission side of their system worked. We hadn’t been exposed to it, so it was a lot of learning on the job, in conjunction with the [customer’s] program manager,” explained Wilson. “It was during a time when there was beginning to be a lot more scrutiny on transmission lines and the first FAC-003-1 (a federal document that transmission owners have to follow across the country) was being implemented.”
What started as getting an initial grip on the customer’s vegetation throughout the rights-of-way (ROWs), reclaiming overgrown ROWs, and educating residents, to maintaining those easements and relationships.
“I’ve been dealing with the same people over the years and know what their concerns are. The fact that I’ve been there so long, I think, helps that they see me regularly, they get to know me, I get to know them, and what their issues are. It makes working through those issues a lot easier,” says Wilson.
Guiding the next generation of foresters
How does one convert nearly a quarter century’s-worth of into guidance for industry rookies? Wilson says the first year or two are the “major learning times” — especially the first two months.
He explains, “It’s easy to feel overwhelmed with the amount of information that’s getting thrown at you. It takes a good year or two to really start learning the job properly – especially if you get the opportunity to go back over the work you did in the previous year so you can see if different trees were correct or incorrect.”
Once employees find that grounding, Wilson encourages them to take every opportunity possible to advance their careers. “There have been so many different, yet great experiences –being out on the transmission easements, you get to go out to these beautiful places that not too many people get to see,” he notes.
The part of Wilson’s career over the years that has made the greatest impact is “being out in the parks near the cities and feeling like you’re in the middle of nowhere, then being able to go home at the end of the day.”
