City Eyes Snow Removal Plans for Winter

Snow removal isn’t on most people’s minds in July, but Traverse City commissioners are already looking ahead to the winter season.

While the city’s ordinance requires residents and business owners to remove any snow or ice from the sidewalks around their properties, the city nonetheless regularly also clears sidewalks and trails. That program is facing rising staffing and equipment costs, however, especially as the city continues to add more sidewalks – with commissioners weighing the tradeoffs of cutting back plowing services versus finding a way to pay for more staff.

City Mobility Infrastructure Director Chris Weber recently appeared before commissioners to discuss snow removal options. Thought residents are responsible for clearing their own sidewalks, they’ve come to see the city’s plowing program as one of the “top two” services they depend on along with leaf removal, Weber said. City staff maintain seven sidewalk snow removal routes, with a downtown route and the Boardman Lake Loop Trail covered by contractors.

“It kind of grew into this thing where we're doing every sidewalk, every trail, and it's something that the residents have not only come to love but come to expect,” Weber said.

However, that expectation can mean dissatisfied residents and angry calls when sidewalks aren’t cleared fast enough, Weber said. In major snowstorms, it can sometimes take staff five to six days to get through all the sidewalks. It also costs the city about $200,000 a year in labor and equipment costs to provide removal services, Weber said. While “everybody wants to be able to walk and bike” – and accessibility is crucial not just in the summer but year-round, Weber said – the city is also struggling to keep up.

Snow removal is typically provided by on-call seasonal workers paid $18-$20 per hour who are asked to work at 3am in the morning “in the worst weather in a tiny little metal can,” Weber said. The job can be stressful, with operators having to navigate sidewalks and roadways shared by pedestrians and other vehicles. Two employees quit after the first day of training because of those difficulties, Weber said. The unpredictability of hours and lack of year-round employment also makes it challenging to fill the positions, he said.

Weber outlined three different options for consideration going forward. The first would be to provide a “Cadillac” level of service for city residents. Rather than rely on seasonal employees, the city could hire up to five additional full-time employees who could work on other projects – like parks or road paving work – in the summer. That staffing level would improve response times and provide consistent citywide removal service, he said. It would also require more equipment, with staffing costs estimated at $600,000 annually and equipment at an initial $200,000 investment.

A second “status quo” option would continue the patchwork system that exists today. While it wouldn’t entail any major budget increase and would fall in line with current resident expectations for service, the city would likely continue to experience delays during major snow events and struggle with employee recruitment and equipment maintenance issues. The city also continues to add new sidewalks and trails, so the status quo is “increasingly difficult to sustain long term,” according to Weber.

A third option would halt city clearance of sidewalks except for those adjacent to its own properties, like the Governmental Center, parks, and public facilities. Property owners would be responsible for the rest, as they technically already are now under the city ordinance. Weber said the level of service Traverse City provides is not necessarily common across northern winter climate regions, with other communities instead focusing on enforcement and ticketing property owners if they don’t keep their sidewalks clear.

Weber said such an approach would represent a “significant change in public expectations” in Traverse City. And while it’s the lowest-cost option, the city would still have to invest some level of funding in enforcement to ensure compliance, he said. Both commissioners and staff agreed option three was the least desirable, in no small part because the city’s aging and disabled populations would likely struggle to keep up with their own snow removal. “Open sidewalks don’t end in November,” said Commissioner Heather Shaw. “They should be open all year round.”

Several commissioners advocated for a “compromise” approach between options one and two. Instead of immediately hiring five new full-time employees, a middle ground could include hiring one or two such employees and slowly developing the program over time. It could also look like increasing hourly wages and introducing retention bonuses for seasonal employees, commissioners agreed. Mayor Amy Shamroe said that during budget discussions, it’s important to emphasize to residents that the snow removal program “comes with a cost” and has implications for other expenditures.

“It’s technically the owner's responsibility, and everybody expects us to do it,” she said. “Then we're stuck with a lot of money that's not really being accounted for, because the expectation is there but people aren't realizing that's actually extra strain on the budget.”

Mayor Pro Tem Laura Ness said she thought the city was offering “pretty darn close to a premium service already,” advocating for considering the “most creative, efficient way that we can accomplish” goals for reliable snow removal. City Manager Benjamin Marentette said staff would return in August with a proposal that covered some of the compromise suggestions. He recommended holding off hiring any new full-time employees until a planned discussion this fall on spending down the city’s fund balance. “We’ve got a lot to consider in terms of funding needs and revenue constraints,” he said.

Commissioners also said they’d like to revisit the city ordinance related to snow removal. “I'm always concerned with an ordinance that isn't grounded in reality,” Ness said. Commissioner Kenneth Funk agreed. “What is the point of this if we're not going to enforce it?” he asked. “We definitely need to revisit this policy and adjust it before winter.” Shamroe said that tweaking the language could help make it clearer what city employees versus residents are responsible for addressing.

Staff also said they’d review routes to look at opportunities to better address alleys – which are at the bottom of the priority list for plowing – and increase efficiencies in snow removal patterns overall.