Let us hope it holds out until way into 2010 so that we spend less on the snow budget of almost 1/2 million dollars  and enjoy the great holiday offerrings here and at the Grant too...see the calendar

City's snow removal budget explodes to $465,000 after terrible '08-'09

PAWTUCKET - Officials have boosted the city's snow removal budget by more than $200,000 for the coming winter after overshooting last year's line item by more than $360,000.

Pawtucket taxpayers spent a whopping $633,000 during a brutal winter of 2008-2009, according to Public Works Director Jack Carney, after leaders budgeted just $270,000 for all costs associated with snow removal.

"Last year was a tough year," said Carney. "There is really no way to estimate what you're going to spend on salt, sand and outside contractors."

Unlike some other municipalities where officials try to guess how much they will need to spend, Pawtucket uses a standard formula that has more often than not worked well over the years, according to Carney. Each year Finance Director Ron Wunschel determines the upcoming budget based on an average cost for the previous three winters, he said.

Last year's budgeted amount of $270,000 for the entire winter was the number reached by averaging the costs for the previous three winters, but all it took was one devastating cold season to increase that three-year mean, or average, to $465,000 for the upcoming winter.

Even after the snow was all gone last year, Highway Department employees spent much longer than normal cleaning up all the sand and salt that had accumulated.

Carney said there is at least one factor that points to spending less this year, even though some experts are forecasting heavy snow during the winter months. The price of salt, which ballooned to $78.58 per ton during a salt shortage last winter, said Carney, has gone down more than $6 to $72.04 per ton this year. Salt alone, with 2,100 tons used last winter, cost Pawtucket taxpayers more than $165,000.

Highway personnel have utilized the same snow removal system for the past decade, dividing the city up into 26 different routes and five quadrants.

The city uses its own plows, one large one and another mounted on a pickup truck, in half of the 26 snow removal districts. Outside contractors are hired each year to plow the other 13 districts.

Employees are putting the finishing touches on the Highway Department's snow removal equipment after spending an entire Saturday in October preparing each truck with everything it will need for a long winter on the road. Mechanical problems were repaired, wipers replaced, and fluids filled.

According to Superintendent of Streets and Bridges Ron Leitao, the goal over the next few days is to wrap up patching of roads as the Highway Department completes the transition from road reconstruction mode to snow removal mode.

"The roads have to be as pothole-free as possible before winter," said Leitao, speaking in front of route maps in the Highway Department's main control room.

Highway workers are finishing up the road construction season by repaving certain portions of the Route 95 detour even as they repair and update equipment at the Public Works garage at 250 Armistice Blvd.

"We try to be as proactive as we can be," Leitao told The Breeze. "We get weather updates every day, radar, we can can check the ground temperature to know exactly what to expect."

Leitao typically sends two extra plows to the downtown area, ones he says are important to prevent a backup of vehicles along the Route 95 detour route.

Leitao said that while it's a relief to see salt prices on their way down, he and others in the Public Works Department are working on other ways to save money. They are currently in the process of installing a tank that will hold a magnesium calcium chloride mix, a solution that makes for more effective sanding and salting of Pawtucket's roadways. Salt is useless, said Leitao, if the temperature is under 19 degrees.

Whether they are veterans rookies, all of those who will be operating snow removal machinery this winter will go through training exercises over the next month, according to Leitao.

Carney said that there are certain things residents must do to make sure snow is removed as quickly and efficiently as possible this winter, while maintaining the quality of life for themselves and their neighbors.

If there are two or more inches of snow, residents have to park in specially assigned parking lots around the city. Without fail, some residents will still leave their cars parked on the street during a storm, and those cars will be ticketed, towed, or both, according to Carney.

Residents can also help city employees by clearing away snow and ice from storm drains, sidewalks and fire hydrants.

Each year, said Carney, he and other personnel get some phone calls of complaint from residents who don't think they plowed enough, plowed too much or don't like how snow was plowed into their driveway after they shoveled.

The best approach, he said, is to take each complaint as it comes and to keep a consistent snow removal plan in place for each storm, no matter what the forecast.

"Every storm is different, we'll get patted on the back after one and have everyone angry at us after another," he said. "The formula we use is the same every time, but what makes us look good is when the sun comes out after a storm."

All Public Works employees can do is make sure they're as prepared as they can be whenever snow is in the forecast.

"We think we've got everything covered," said Carney, who added that "it could snow any day now."

Great idea for next week as I have picked some specoial gifts for friends...but have never been to the Grant...

Good idea to help local artists and have fun avoiding the traffic to the malls and check out local shops as wel as Grant and the Foundry Art sales like Hope Artiste and other Pawtucket Arts Collaborative members too.