Blizzard of 2010: Municipal Budget Buster
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
The inconvenience Rhode Islanders experienced following a blizzard that blanketed the state with over a foot of snow pales in comparison to the headaches many cash-strapped cities and towns will be facing if the storm served as a preview of what’s to come during the winter months.
While the first storm of the year falls into every city’s budget, a snow-filled winter could be very damaging across the state according to Providence City Councilman John IIgliozzi.
“This was the first snow of the year so it’s within our budget,” IIgliozzi said. “But if you start to get five, six snowstorms in a row, then you become concerned. The problem is no matter how many times it snows, it’s not like you can not plow the streets. So if you start to see storm after storm, we have to overspend.”
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Providence Public Works Director Paul Thomas said he wouldn’t know until sometime on Tuesday just how much Sunday evening’s blizzard cost the capital city, but he noted that Monday was not a holiday for city employees so they wouldn’t be getting any overtime.
Thomas also praised the work his staff and the vendors did to remove the snow and ensure the roads were safe to navigate on Monday morning. He said the biggest problem for Providence is when private citizens plow the snow from their driveways into the street, covering the salt city trucks have laid down.
Doing more with les
Pawtucket City Councilman Al Vitali said despite budget constraints, he felt this city’s Public Works Department did a great job preparing for the blizzard and then removing the snow once it started.
“[The city] handled it better than ever,” Vitali said. “Especially considering you probably have to do more with less because of the finances. The workers were out there on Christmas getting ready for the storm and they were ready to roll once it hit.”
Nothing like the December Debacle
Because the blizzard had been predicted for days and children throughout the state are on school vacation, Councilman IIgliozzi said this storm didn’t decimate the state the same way a weaker December storm did three years ago.
“This was nothing like the December Debacle,” IIgliozzi said, referring to the 2007 blizzard that left school children stranded on busses and wound up costing a number of city and state employees their jobs. “Luckily schools were closed and most people weren’t on the road. “
As for the toll a couple similarly strong storms could take on his city?
“It’s only December,” he said. “We still have all of January and February. I’m just praying for a mild winter.”
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