More cold, more salting and plowing, and a need to pay for it

The record cold and early-season snows have led to a lot of already-squeezed local communities facing difficulties in having enough money to keep the roads clear as 2019 nears a close. And because people and businesses need to travel, that unexpected cost means other priorities take a back seat.

In Dunn County, highway commissioner John Sworski said $1.2 million was budgeted for snowplowing and road salt in 2019. He said that total was based on a five-year average of winter maintenance costs. But February was anything but average, he said…

"We already exceeded 100 percent of our winter maintenance budget in March, April," Sworski said. "By that time we had basically gone through our whole yearly budget with anticipating that there’s two and a half to three months of winter yet to come here before we get to our new fiscal year January 1."

Because the winter maintenance budget had already been spent, Sworski said he had to pull around $1 million from funds slated for summer road construction to ensure there was enough money to pay for plowing through the end of 2019.

It’s especially interesting coming on the heels of a report that WisDOT sent to the state’s Joint Finance Committee on October 22 – before the snows of the last 2 weeks started to fall. This report detailed their plans for using highway maintenance and operations funds, and went over their plans for paying for local communities to plow and care for state and federal highways, under a set-aside known as Routine Maintenance Agreements.

…Activities include winter and non-winter routine maintenance such as snow plowing and de-icing; small crack filling and the application of sealcoats; interim repair of highway surfaces and roadside structures; bridge, drainage and culvert maintenance; mowing and vegetation control; sign maintenance and replacement, and other measures deemed necessary to provide adequate traffic service.

If you dig into the April 2019 report filed with the Joint Finance Committee, you’ll see that $5 million in additional funding was given to the counties for the last half of CY 2018 to take care of these costs, but $5 million was reduced from the first half of CY 2019 to make up the difference.

In addition, you’ll notice in that April request that WisDOT had to tap federal funds to take care of the severe winter from the first 3 months of 2019.

As winter costs rose, it became apparent the reserve would not be sufficient. The Department identified federal funding to supplement budgeted segregated state funding for certain federally eligible activities. This allowed the segregated winter reserve to be increased to $15 million [from $11 million]. Unless late winter weather or spring flooding significantly exceeds expectations, the Department does not anticipate an FY19 request for supplemental funding….

WisDOT didn't make an extra request for funds for FY 2019. However, if you look ahead to the July 1, 2019 – June 30, 2020 fiscal year, the winter reserve is back down to $13.8 million from that $15 million, and the projected amount being sent to counties through the RMAs also goes down.

RMAs to counties
Jan – June 2019 original $86.0 million
Jan – June 2019 revised $81.0 million
July – Dec 2019 $66.2 million

And now we have the severe winter weather of late October and November driving up costs at the local level, as Wisconsin Public Radio chronicled this week.

Wisconsin County Highway Association Executive Director Dan Fedderly said the heavy snows of February have hit snowplowing budgets hard across the state but parts of southern Wisconsin including Madison, Milwaukee and La Crosse, may have gotten the worst of it. He said highway commissioners around Wisconsin will be watching their budgets closely as winter takes hold once again in Wisconsin.

"You know, whatever happens right now will be on top of what was the majority of last winter’s cost," Fedderly said.

This higher usage of salt and plowing is going to have to be made up for in some way over the last 6 weeks in this year, or in the form of less money for the locals to carry over into 2020, and possible deferments in maintenance for next year.

Fortunately, the first Evers budget added more money in state aids for maintenance, as part of a $320 million increase in highway rehab over the next 2 years. But it might not matter that much if the weather continues to be as brutal as it has been. You might want to file this away as the winter drags on, because we an already-stretched DOT might have to come up with more money to take care of plowing and salting in the next few months.