Sparse Snowfall Aids Madison Streets Division Budget

The city of Madison has only seen about 23 inches of snow this winter.

The clear upside of this below-average snowfall is benefit it provides the Madison Streets Division budget. City officials said they’ve saved thousands of dollars.

“This has been a really good year for the budget on snow removal,” said George Dreckmann, of the Madison Streets Division. “We budget on a calendar-year basis. So, at the end of 2011, we turned back pretty close to $8,000 in snow and ice control money that we did not use.”

Dreckmann said the city only had to salt streets about 18 times this year, which is about half the number of times it had to in 2010.

Along with less work, comes less overtime, Dreckmann said, which means the budget for 2012 is on track.

But the department will have to wait until the snowfall in November and December 2012 to see if it will profit again.