Road budgets feel winter’s chill

Mike Hall of the state Highway and Transportation Department sweeps up salt and sand Friday along Interstate 430 at the Rodney Parham Road exit in Little Rock.
Mike Hall of the state Highway and Transportation Department sweeps up salt and sand Friday along Interstate 430 at the Rodney Parham Road exit in Little Rock.

— The cost of clearing snow and ice from Arkansas highways during the winter storm season is threatening to break last season’s record of $11.5 million - an amount that’s more than twice what the state Highway and Transportation Department sets aside for plowing and sanding.

In February alone, the state saw three snowstorms of varying intensity, according to the National Weather Service. They were capped by the Feb. 6-11 disturbance that socked the state with as much as 2 feet of snow, mostly in Northwest Arkansas.

“We are now approaching the $10 million mark,” Glenn Bolick, a spokesman for the Highway Department, said this week, referring to preliminary department estimates. “I know for a fact that we were over $5 million, and with this latest round we most likely are near or over $9 million - no real numbers, just past experience and good guessing by a few folks.

“The bottom line is ... if we have even one more fairly significant event, we will most likely break that $11.5 [ million] mark from last year.”

City street and county road departments have endured similar budget shocks to cover overtime, equipment wear, and sand and salt stocks.

“This is, by far, the worst in my seven years,” said Eric Petty, operations manager for the Little Rock Public Works Department.

Petty and other state and local road officials expressed confidence they can absorb the hits Old Man Winter so far has delivered.

The state Highway Department budgets $5 million a year for snow and ice removal. When the cost eclipses that amount, it means less money is available for other maintenance activities, although department officials said that basic maintenance, such as filling in potholes left in the wake of snow and ice, still gets done.

“Ultimately, our goal is to keep the roadways safe,” said another agency spokesman, David Nilles. “So, if there are potholes, etc., that need to be repaired, we will make those repairs. The maintenance that may wait until later are items like ditch clearing, shoulder repair, etc.”

While the final numbers won’t be available for at least a month, according to Nilles, there’s little doubt that the cost will exceed last year’s spending for some areas of the state

For the department’s District 4, which covers seven counties in part of Northwest Arkansas, “This may the most expensive winter ever,” said Joe Shipman, the district’s top engineer.

The district incurred snow- and ice-removal costs totaling nearly $2.3 million in fiscal 2010, which ran from July 1, 2009, to June 30, 2010. The amount was second only to District 9, which covers eight other counties in the region. It recorded nearly $2.9 million.

Together, the two districts accounted for 45 percent of the $11.5 million spent on snow and ice removal statewide.

“Well, the storms last year didn't seem bad for those of us here in central Arkansas,” Nilles said. “However, Northwest Arkansas got hit over and over last winter.”

This year seems like it easily will reach the same amount for Northwest Arkansas, according to Shipman, who oversees District 4 operations in Crawford, Franklin, Logan, Polk, Scott, Sebastian and Washington counties.

“I’ve lost count,” he said of the snowstorms in his area. “We’ve had four or five major events now and have had several smaller events.”

Even before the new year, the district had crews out on Thanksgiving night and Christmas morning to clear major highways, he said. “We didn’t use a lot of material, but we were out.”

Virtually back-to-back snowstorms in February, however, taxed his 275 employees, who are responsible for more than 1,600 miles of highways, and their equipment, which ran 24 hours a day.

This month, his crews went out at midnight Feb. 1 for the month’s first storm and worked continuously through the night of Feb. 6, Shipman said.

The crews were back on the roads two days later for the second and bigger storm. They worked 12-hour shifts around the clock.

Still, maintenance money will be available for regular maintenance work. Shipman said he can request supplemental funding. He asked for and received $150,000 in supplemental funding last year.

“It’s hard not to do the potholes,” he said. “But that money [supplemental funding] comes out of someone else’s budget.”

Cities and counties had their hands full as well.

Little Rock has spent $124,909 on sand and salt since Jan. 1, Petty said. That amount is nearly double what it spent all of last year - $68,142, he said.

At the height of the second storm, on Feb. 9, the city spread 835 cubic yards of material, Petty said. For the year, the city has used 3,941 cubic yards. “We’re getting close to double last year’s usage.”

Overtime also has been hit. In January, city public works crews amassed $21,000 in overtime. City crews matched that figure in the first two weeks of February, racking up $21,584 in overtime.

Petty, whose crews are working on filling about 180 potholes flagged by residents, hopes the worst of the winter weather has passed.

“Yes, we can absorb another winter storm,” he said. “But what these storms can do is cause challenges later in the year.”

The city could have less money for asphalt and concrete, but the city has a contingency reserve fund it can tap in emergencies, something the city hasn’t done in his memory. Petty doesn’t want to get to that point. “Hopefully, that’s the last event of the year.”

Meanwhile, Pulaski County used an estimated 300 to 400 tons of sand on its 1,021 miles of county roads during the last storm, said Sherman Smith, the county’s public works director. Its fleet includes six dump trucks equipped with blades and spreaders, four four-wheel drive pickups with smaller blades used in subdivisions, and three road graders.

The snowfall was “above normal, but we could handle it,” Smith said, noting that advance warnings left little traffic on the streets, making snow-clearing operations move more “quickly and efficiently.” Pulaski County’s Public Works Department already has used nearly half of its overtime budget, Smith added. The county’s budget is on a calendar year, which means it has half of its overtime budget to cover the remaining 10 months of 2011.

But that is misleading, Smith said. The beginning of the budget year generally coincides with the worst part of the winter, he said.Plus, overtime accrued to clean up damage from tornadoes later in the year often is reimbursed by the federal government. And, when the budget year comes to an end at the beginning of winter in November and December, it rarely snows.

“It might look skewed, but it’s pretty close to what has happened in the past,” Smith said.

Front Section, Pages 1 on 02/19/2011

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