Village of Island Park ready for eventual snow

The winter of 2011-12 has been thankfully calm thus far. However, snow is bound to fall eventually. And when it does, the Village of Island Park is ready to take care of it.

“We’re all set,” said Island Park Mayor James Ruzicka. He said that the village’s plows are ready and its pickup trucks have been outfitted with plows and sand spreaders.

“This year, we budgeted $10,300,” Ruzicka said. “Last year we had budgeted $14,300, and it was a bad year, and we still came in at $10,000. So we brought our budget down to match last year.” Ruzicka explained that storms last year hit on weekends and holidays, forcing the village to pay its workers overtime. But even with all of the overtime pay, the expenses still came in under budget, which is why the village lowered expense for this year.

The village has enough sand and snow stockpiled to cover the streets for two decent-sized storms — around 10 inches of snow, Ruzicka said. He also estimated that a storm of that size costs the village around $3,000 to clean the streets, depending on when the storm hits.

But the village only sends out its plows if four inches of snow accumulates. Less than that, and it’s too difficult for the plows to clean.

It takes a lot of man-hours for the village to clean the streets, though, no matter when the storm hits. “Our guys, on a 10-inch storm, will probably work 16 hours,” Ruzicka said. “They go around the clock, basically.” Generally, Ruzicka said, the Department of Sanitation workers will plow the streets until they’re clean, and then take a break. “And if the snow has stopped before they go out again the next day, they get 8 hours off, because we can’t keep them,” said Ruzicka.

The village is also ready for the off chance that the snow removal will go over budget. In that case, the village would have to cut funds from another part of the project to transfer to the snow removal line. Conversely, if there’s money left over once spring comes, then it could be used for other things in the village.

When the snow does come, Ruzicka asked that residents make sure not to shovel the snow from their properties into the streets.

“What happens is the cars pack it down and the plows can’t pick it up,” Ruzicka said. “Then we have ice spots all over the place and nothing but complaints into Village Hall saying we didn’t plow the road, which is not the truth.”

Ruzicka also said that residents shouldn’t put out their garbage when a sever snow storm hits. Since the Department of Sanitation is responsible for cleaning the snow, there wouldn’t be garbage collection on those days.

“All [the garbage] does is blow around the streets, and our guys would be tied up doing snow removal,” said Ruzicka.