New Snow Policy a 'Learning Curve,' Public Works Director Says

At Wednesday night's board of aldermen meeting, Interim Director of Wentzville Public Works Doug Lee recapped the city's response to the Feb. 21 snowstorm.

"Overall, the operation was pretty effective," Lee said. "There's a learning curve that goes along with everything."

Lee was referring to a new snow plowing policy that called for a new procedure: initially, one pass into a subdivision and one pass out. That allowed snow plow drivers to cover the entire city in one shift. Cul-de-sacs received two passes from plows, one to push snow to the outside and one to push snow to the inside.

"By 8 a.m., we were able to hit every street in the city," Lee said. Crews then went back for the second half of the operation, to complete the process of curb-to-curb removal.

That process caused some concerns from residents, since additional plowing pushed snow back into driveways that had already been cleared, and created concerns about access to mailboxes and problems with trash collection.

Ward 1 Alderman Forrest Gossett said he thought staff did a remarkable job.

"We, as residents, need to be responsible for our own mailboxes," he said.

He referred to a number of complaints that the city received along with compliments about the snow plowing efforts.

"People in the cul-de-sacs are not happy," he said. "We need to explain why we do what we do."

By 3:30 a.m. on Feb. 22, Lee said, streets were clear and snow plowing operations were shut down. The entire operation took 500 man-hours and 312 tons of salt.

A GPS system put into place last year to map the plows and their progress was considered to be every effective in previous snow events. The city is currently without a GIS (Geographical Information System) coordinator, however, and crews were unable to take advantage of the system with this latest snowstorm.

Police Chief Lisa Harrison said that police went door-to-door to get some residents to move their cars off the streets. She said that some verbal and some written warnings were given, but no summonses were issued. "Overall, there was very good cooperation from residents," she said.

In the future, summonses will be issued and mailed to violators who don't move their cars off the street during a three-inch or deeper snow emergency.