What's the Assignment

I am given all sorts of request in my capacity as a consulting arborist. The key is defining the assignment. Why you ask? Because if you stray you'll get in trouble later on, at a deposition, or from the witness stand. Sounds like wearing blinders, but lawyers are tricky, cunning people who make a living dissecting words. They thrive on confusing and twisting words. Now people, ordinary people usually see through this when they are forced to sit on juries. They look at these tactics as trickery not evidence.

An arborist report is an independent report freely found and based on facts, physical features that are visible or can be safely assumed based on experience. It may not be a perfect document due to it's nature of being an opinion. Try getting two arborist to agree on anything is difficult. Appraisals will vary, diagnosis may not be clear and cause and results will always have variables. But one thing you can count on is that it's is a freely arrived opinion based on what evidence may have been present and hopefully answers the assignment.

So when you need a consulting arborist, before you call around ask you self the following: what is the question I need answers to, what are my goals and expectations. Then collect what you know to present as background be careful to take the emotional aspect of the problem out of the equation and relate only the facts. Then the arborist will tell you what he or she thinks the assignment is and more importantly that they are either taking on the assignment or not. A fee should be quoted, a request for a retainer and finally that the results may or may not help your cause. After you receive the report and review with the arborist, then you can decide what the next step is. Lawsuits move through the courts at a snails pace, and as the years grind on litigants become more and more hostile as legal fees rise. I am a big supporter of mediation. The art of a good comprise is an American tradition, try it.