BRATTLEBORO — As drivers throughout Windham County found themselves scrambling to schedule snow tire switch-outs in the lead-up to the storm on Nov. 15 and 16, staffers at the Department of Public Works (DPW) had their own problems.
The sidewalk plow was out of commission.
To prepare for the snow, “we had all of our equipment ready, including the sidewalk plow,” said DPW Director Steve Barrett, who added, “We even did a dry run.”
But, as the snow continued falling on Nov. 16, dropping 6 inches in some parts of town, “we took out the sidewalk plow, and it broke,” he said.
Barrett noted it didn't even get further than 1 foot from its starting place.
“We spent about eight hours troubleshooting the sidewalk plow,” and DPW staff talked to workers in the factory where it was manufactured, said Barrett.
The town issued a press release notifying residents of the breakdown and likely delays in clearing the sidewalks.
Then, a few hours later, success.
The machine was up and running, just in time for an early-evening mission after the roads got plowed.
“It worked out good,” said Barrett.
In March, Representative Town Meeting approved the purchase of an additional sidewalk plow, due to arrive Dec. 1, which would have been helpful in the storm.
“We're anxiously awaiting its arrival,” said Barrett.
Caught off guard?
“People were caught off guard,” Barrett said. “Traditionally, we've had storms around Thanksgiving, but to have a storm that early is unusual. People are usually preparing for snow in November,” he said - not experiencing it.
“It takes us a good part of the year to prepare all of the DPW's equipment,” he noted.
In the spring, Barrett's staff washes down the road equipment with a neutralizer to guard against salt damage, and they begin the process of repainting the plow trucks and keeping everything in good working order.
“An important piece is maintenance. This equipment is expensive,” Barrett said.
'More intense storms'
Although the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has announced, “Scientific evidence for warming of the climate system is unequivocal,” one can find a more local source: the DPW.
Has Barrett noticed a change?
“We've seen more intense storms. And stormwater runoff is a big challenge, and not necessarily even during big storms,” Barrett said.
“This July, there was almost 12 inches of rain. From July to September, we got more than a year's worth of rain. The result of getting a lot of rain from intense storms is that it damages roads and infrastructure, and threatens property,” he said.
“I wouldn't be surprised if we had a series of large snowfall events if this pattern continues,” Barrett said.
How does Barrett anticipate these unusual events when he's drafting his department's budget?
November and December is budget season, when the DPW and other municipal departments submit their respective anticipated expenses and revenues to the Selectboard for the following fiscal year.
Then, after the board assembles a whole budget for consideration - and then modification and approval - by members of Representative Town Meeting, the budget goes into effect for the next fiscal year, which begins July 1.
That means the budget is prepared 12 to 16 months in advance.
The weather forecast
Barrett explained the process.
“We look at historical data and narrow it down to an average of the last five years,” he said, and acknowledged, “it's hard to meet the target right on. Some winters are light, some are heavy.”
The big items in the DPW's budget, Barrett said, are salt and sand for the roads, and labor and overtime for the workers who spread it around.
Equipment maintenance is another big-ticket item. The trucks are “large and expensive, and we work them very hard,” Barrett said.
The unknown variable affecting DPW costs is the weather.
What can challenge a budget is “when we've had a tough winter, a large mud season, and a spectacular pothole season,” said Barrett.
If his department has exhausted its funds for salt, sand, labor, overtime, and equipment maintenance, what can Barrett do to cover costs for the remainder of the fiscal year?
“We have to pull [money] from other places in the budget, tighten in other areas,” he said.
If the town experiences something unusual that puts extraordinary and unanticipated pressure on the DPW's budget, like multiple major storms, “we can pull from the town-wide reserve fund, but it requires a special Representative Town Meeting,” said Barrett, who noted, “that's pretty rare.”
“We've never had to pull from the reserve, but we've had to sacrifice other things,” during his tenure as DPW director, Barrett said.