‘Brown Christmas’ nets catch-up time for county road department

A relatively snow-free December has given Whitman County road crews a chance to catch up on two years of deferred maintenance.

Record snowfall in 2008 and 2009 kept workers in the county’s Public Works department on snow plows for 12 hours a day for weeks at a time. This year, crews have not had to log overtime hours.

“I prayed for a brown Christmas, and I got it,” said Mark Storey, director of the public works department. “Santa was a very good man this year.”

So far this year, Storey’s department has spent $259,100 on snow removal, just over 55 percent of the budgeted amount. Most of that amount was spent at the beginning of the year, when blizzards were continuing to pummel the county.

“Remember it snowed straight until January fifth last year,” said Storey.

By contrast, the county last year spent $1,029,229 on snow removal – 248 percent of the budgeted amount.

The figure reflects the heavy battle crews waged when winter cranked up last December, and it reflects the amount of funds spent in the first months of 2008, the first of two rough winters.

When snow expenses outpace expectations, Storey said, the money is paid either out of the county road department’s reserve fund or is taken out of summertime projects like chip-sealing and road grading.

Storey said he is hesitant to tap the reserve fund, which is currently near $4 million, in case it is needed to address a disastrous storm or infrastructure failure.

If a bridge were to fall or heavy flooding were to hit the county, the road department would need that money to respond.

Repairs to roads from the great flood of 1996 cost the county nearly $1.5 million. Storey noted that was in 1996 dollars and the cost would be much higher today.

With crew members freed from the seat of a plow, they can this year undertake maintenance projects that were delayed by snow removal.

Crews are now digging out ditches, repairing equipment, trimming trees along rights-of-way and doing maintenance work on bridges.

Engineers have the time to survey quarries and determine the size of rock stockpiles as required by state audit crews.

“We’re really getting a chance to catch our breath and catch up on some of the things we haven’t been able to do,” said Storey.