Your question resolves to "how many PG&E employees does it take to cut a tree limb encroaching on a powerline easement on public or private land in today’s California regulatory environment?"
My answer would likely be around ~100 or so, give or take a dozen.
Start with a line walking crew doing the survey to notice the encroachment and note the work needs to be done, probably three to four workers plus a supervisor.
Their survey report for that line goes to a committee which will prioritize that line’s work against a budget and the urgency of other lines, likely about five people.
Once it is scheduled, and it reaches the top, it will be assigned to a PG&E biologist who will assemble a team of other biologists and ecologists to do a site biology and ecology impact statement for the work slated to be done. This could involve several fields of specialists depending on the biota and ecology of the area. It could involve anywhere from four to ten specialists. The prepared ecological and biological (and occasionally an economic in which case they would need to bring in PG&E’s office of Economic Development and its staff to do an impact evaluation, likely two to four people) impact statements must be filed with the State of California Environmental Protection Agency, and also with the Federal EPA. . . and perhaps with the Economic Development Department.
This now involves PG&E’s legal department which must review the various biological, environmental, ecological, and possibly economical impact statements to be certain all the regulatory requirements for such reports have their "i"s dotted and "t"s crossed and that they don’t accidentally raise a red flag making a regulatory mess of things. This likely requires several paralegals and a supervising attorney, plus the efforts of a clerk or two, and actually might involve two or three different legal departments. Likely six to nine people.
These statements must be allowed a period for public review and comment. It is possible a public hearing will be required. If so, a PG&E PR Representatives and the district manager and district engineer plus a designated flunky staff person where the line is located will have to attend to answer questions, whether they know answers or not. Likely an attorney to keep them out of trouble, too. Five people.
Once the impact statements are approved after being brought before multiple meetings of all pertinent government bodies, which ALSO require PG&E staff in attendance to answer why this work is necessary, Probably an additional ten or so people. The impact statements are approved.
These approvals are returned to PG&E legal, and distributed through the internal email (IT gets involved, two people).
A work order is finally generated. Copies are sent to a survey team to go and mark line beyond which the tree cutting team cannot cut lest they go beyond the easement. That’s likely four to five men. Human Resources is notified to set up per job Workers Comp for this specific project, as is accounting, and internal PG&E OSHA monitoring because tree trimming is one of the most hazardous jobs there is, especially using chain saws, and a crew of fire fighters is put on standby—sparks from the gasoline chain saw engines, you know. And, add security due to rabid environmentalists who are known to chain themselves to trees to prevent work. Waste must be hauled away. Add approximately twenty more people.
Oops, almost forgot the guys with the chainsaws, rope, axes, etc. who do the actual work. . . That’s about six.
And that’s how you get to about 100 people to cut a limb from a tree encroaching into a powerline easement in today’s California regulatory environment. . .
So in other words, “let it burn”.
LOL