Who We Are
SoCal Brush is a contracting firm that specialize in fire hazard prevention services for Los Angeles, Ventura, and Santa Barbara Counties. Our services include Weed Abatement, Fire Hazard Reduction, and Land Clearance.
With a Class B (General Building Contractor) and C-61/D-49 (Tree Service) licenses from the California State License Board we focus on government and commercial projects.
In sum, we pride ourselves on our ability to understand the needs of our communities. To help our communities expand safely in while protecting our wildlife as well. SoCal Brush’s management have been leaders in this field.
Leading the Industry
Our team of highly motivated project managers and crew leaders have worked for Los Angeles and Ventura County Fire Departments on wild-land fire crews. Holding years of experience conducting large scale weed abatement projects in within our areas of service.
At SoCal Brush we provide the most advanced Eco-friendly techniques and methods in the industry. We don’t fall in line with short-lived trends or fads. We build lasting relationships with our customers whether they are local government, business clients, or Southern California home-owners.
We have worked with a variety of client’s ranging from the private to public sector
SoCal Brush Team
Wendy Schmelter
President and Project Executive
https://www.linkedin.com/in/wendy-gonzalez-050539194/
Wendy started in the construction industry with Gonzalez and Sons Construction, where she oversaw extensive multi-level framing projects. She mastered skills such as prevailing wage, building code and permits, planning, and staff management. Wendy began running a landscape division for Gonzalez and Sons Construction and then decided to open her own company. She then created Beyond the Bushes and now has over 15 years of experience managing large scale commercial and government construction projects. Having lived in Ventura County her whole life and personally going through numerous wildfire events that threatened her community, she created SoCal Brush, which specializes in wild-land fire hazard reductions to help protect our community from these natural threats.
Carey Everhart
Project Manager
Carey joined the team in 2014 and was brought on as a foreman for residential landscape construction projects. Carey now runs crews for weed abatement and brush clearance jobs. He has years of experience with the Santa Barbara and Ventura County Fire Department Fire Crews conducting large scale wild land fire operations. Carey was a Sawyer during the fire season and would run the vegetation management crews on the off season conducting many weed abatement projects all over Southern California.
Jared Schmelter
Operations Manager
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jared-ryan-400556124/
Jared joined the team in 2014. He oversaw all landscape construction projects. He has managed construction projects for Federal and local governments including the United States Navy, water districts, local municipalities, county projects and countless private commercial entities. Jared worked for the Ventura County Fire Department on the wild-land fire crew. He gained his fire hazard reduction knowledge on live fire operations, on some of California’s largest wildfires in history. On the fire crew, he also gained weed abatement expertise and performed extensive weed abatement and brush clearance operations throughout Ventura County.
Justin Iglehart
Machine Operator and Crew Leader
Justin was recruited to the team in 2016 because of his extensive experience with fire hazard reduction tasks. He worked on the Santa Barbara County Fire Hand Crew for five years working on some of the largest wild land fires in the history of California. Justin operated many forms of heavy machinery on live fire operations and ran weed abatement and vegetation management projects during the off season.
James Kitka
ISA Certified Arborist and Qualified Applicator
https://www.treesaregood.org/findanarborist/verify
James is an ISA certified Arborist (WE-13669A) as well as a Qualified Applicator License B (#162591). James is also a vegetation management crew leader as well as a heavy equipment operator. James has managed large tree care projects for Conejo Open Space Conservation Agency, Conejo Recreation & Park District, City of Thousand Oaks, County of Los Angeles, Santa Monica Malibu School District and many others.
Frank Gonzalez
Superintendent
Frank has run countless multi-million dollar construction projects for commercial and government clients, including large scale landscape to high rise buildings. There is no project too big for Frank to tackle head on. He is a master at overseeing jobs with large crews and intricate tasks. Frank will always make sure a project is done right, and done on time.