Educational Sessions

ACRT Inc.

Keith Norton is Manager of Training and Lead Training Instructor for ACRT Inc. Keith is an ISA Certified Arborist and Certified Tree Worker – Climber Specialist with over 30 years of experience in the tree care industry. He has taught climbing, rigging, utility line clearance certification, crane use in arboriculture, aerial lift operation and aerial rescue throughout the United States and Virgin Islands. He is a voting member of the Accredited Standards Committee Z133 and serves on the Electrical Hazards and Crane Use sub-committees. He has been in involved in many facets of the tree care industry including owning his own tree service. Keith is a published author on the subject of tree care and tree care safety. Keith was a student in ACRT classes in the 1990’s and joined ACRT as a Job Corps Urban Forestry Instructor from 2001 – 2005 and became lead training instructor in 2011.

Bob Urban is the senior manager for risk management and Urban Forestry Training. Bob is an ISA Certified Arborist, Certified Utility Specialist and expert witness with over 25 years of experience in the tree care industry. With over 20 years at ACRT, Bob has served in roles from Utility Forester to Operations Director. He was a senior instructor and a substitute Job Corps Urban Forestry Instructor with ACRT’s training department from 1999 – 2001. Currently he develops material and testing for in-house employee training, development of custom training courses and participates as a Utility Arborist Specialist preparatory instruction. His prior work experience is in the residential/commercial tree trimming industry in the south Florida region. 

Joseph A. Jimmo is the Field Safety Training Manager for Penn Line Service, a utility contractor based in Western Pennsylvania. Joe coordinates activities of 11 safety trainers embedded with the Company’s vegetation management operations in key geographic areas, and manages the design of safety-related learning for formal training of some 1,000 employees on a semi-annual basis.

Joe has been with Penn Line for 17 years, and has used his considerable field experience to advance a positive workplace culture based on safe work practices. He was instrumental in implementing the Company’s first-ever skill verification process, and—as a strong advocate for employee development—articulated an early vision of professionalism for tree trimmers that underlies today’s training-pervasive environment.

Joe represents Penn Line on industry standard-setting committees, including the Utility Line Clearance Coalition (ULCC) and the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) where he serves as a voting member for the second revision of the ANSI Z-133 standard.  He is a Certified Tree Care Safety Professional (CTSP), and has held multiple accreditations in work zone safety, including as a multi-state instructor.