The Times should have also mentioned that Bell submitted a Snow & Ice Removal budget to the Council which included $0.00.
Fortunately, the City Council increased that line item.
DPW budget snowed under by storm of storms
Staff writer
It was something of a winter-long, perfect storm of storms that forced the city to spend $434,991 more than it had in various highway maintenance accounts - an overage that exceeded the entire original budget by nearly $35,000 - to deal with the average Cape Ann winter.
Average, this winter was not.
"It was an active season," said Charles Foley of the National Weather Service in Taunton. But he said it seemed more active when contrasted to the extra-dry winter of 2006-07.
Even more snow, requiring city and private trucks to lay down more salt and sand and do more plowing, is possible, of course, through early and even mid- spring. But even if we've seen our last winter weather, this winter was excessive and repetitive.
In winter road maintenance, budget overruns are allowed by state law, but it requires the city to backfill the overcharged accounts from the top at the start of next year's spending cycle.
The perfect storm of storms was the seemingly endless cycle of weather systems that rolled in with snow, followed by mild melting temperatures or rain to clear the ground for the next system - and the next, and the next.
In all, according to the National Weather Service, 52 inches of snow fell on the Boston area, 27 inches in December alone.
At times, Cape Ann got a bit more and less, but the totals for Boston are a rough measure of the snow all around here.
Fifty-two inches is 31/2 times as much snow as last winter.
The exasperating thing was how quickly it came and went and came again.
Fourteen times - twice as often as last winter - Public Works Director Joseph Parisi had to send out the plows. Only once in the decade, in 2004-05, did the streets need as much plowing, sanding and salting.
That was Gloucester's first and only million-dollar winter - costing the city more than $1.1 million. And 2004-05 was the winter of record snowfall and the arrival of the National Guard to help the city keep the streets passable.
"The winter from hell," said Parisi. The last blizzard occurred at the end of March, but there was significant snow in April, too.
This year, overall, for all winter weather-related accounts - for everything from gas, parts, food and coffee, sand, tires, overtime and outsourced plowing and sanding - budgeted was $400,900, but fighting winter actually cost $835,891, according to accounting printouts released to the Times by Parisi.
The annual average for the decade was $495,643. Parisi said. "The city traditionally has level funded" the winter accounts, knowing that these are the only ones that can be legally overexpended.
The sand and salt budget was busted but good.
The council gave Public Works the $150,000 it asked for, but to date the city and contractors' trucks have put down $266,951 worth of salt and sand, or around 177 percent of what was budgeted.
That total includes 4,609 tons of salt and 3,156 tons of sand.
The cost was pushed up some by the decision to emphasize salt over sand because of its superior melting qualities, Parisi said.
Salt this year cost $49.34 a ton compared to $12.54 for sand.
The $133,416 in snow and ice removal overtime was 190 percent of budget.
But that overexpenditure paled compared to the overage in contract services - the trucks and plows that backstop the city's rolling stock. The $384,577 spent on contractors was roughly 426 percent of the $90,000 that was budgeted.
Parisi said the city has 25 pieces it can put on the street to plow and sand; it has contracts with another 50 ranging from small pickups with a plow which are paid at $65 an hour to the 10-wheelers that earn $110 an hour.
The food and coffee budget was busted, too.
Although only $700 was set aside for victuals, to date $1,066.59 has been spent.
"When we work around the clock, we provide nourishment to the men," said Parisi.
Richard Gaines may be contacted at rgaines@gloucestertimes.com
