Madison Daily Leader - News - 01/02/2013 - Local snow removal budgets look good

01/02/2013

Local snow removal budgets look good

By CHUCK CLEMENT, Staff Reporter

Madison's public works and Lake County's highway departments said goodbye to 2012 knowing that their budgets for snow removal were in either good shape or even better than good.

For the city, the 2012 snow removal allocation still contained more than half of the budgeted total at year's end. Fred Snoderly, city public works director, said Wednesday (today) that the 2012 snow removal budget should have about $60,000 still on hand after $98,500 was budgeted for last year.

According to Snoderly, mild winter weather at the beginning of 2012 helped keep snow removal expenses down. In addition, the weather so far for winter 2012-13 hasn't gone into the brutal category.

"At the end of 2012, we wound up plowing (snow) only a couple of times," Snoderly said.

According to Snoderly, the snow removal funds pay for many different expenses that include wages, insurance, fuel, rental costs and overtime pay. He said the money left in the 2012 snow removal fund will get transferred back into Madison's general fund.

Scott Mathison, Lake County highway superintendent, estimated that his department was able to "stay under budget overall" in paying for snow removal from county roads. Mathison said the county's budget contained an overall fund for county highways dealing with numerous expenses that include snow removal, road repairs and equipment.

Roberta Janke, county auditor, said that not all of the 2012 highway-related expenses were submitted to her office yet, but she estimated that after those expenses are paid, the 2012 highway budget could still hold about $1,000.

Lake County's highway budget contained about $2.01 million during 2012 and the 2013 budget has about $2.12 million allocated for highway expenses.

Mathison was checking the county highways on Wednesday morning and reported that they were in good shape.

"Everything looks fine right now," Mathison said.

Reporting from the Junius area, he said the winds had started to pick up and some snow was sifting across the roadway, but road drifts had not yet developed.

The National Weather Service was forecasting possible freezing rain until 3 p.m., later developing into snow flurries throughout the night. The area's weather for the rest of the week was predicted as clear and sunny.