SNOW CONCERNS

The first big snowfall/snow storm of the year has come and the cities, counties, and townships have met the challenge. We are a mobile society and we are used to traveling (in fact we are expected by our employers) to travel and “get things done” no matter what the weather.

This puts great expectations on our governmental units to have the manpower, equipment, and abilities to keep the roads open. These capacities of governmental units do not come cheap. Equipment is costly, manpower is costly, and the chemicals or sand/salt mixture used on some of the roads is costly.

Why do governmental units spend taxpayer dollars in these ways? Number one is that citizens expect timely service. Can the citizens get along without these services? Yes, they can, but there is a down side to decreasing these services. For instance, answers to a survey of businesses by the Mankato Area Greater Growth organization found that half of those businesses surveyed indicated ice and snow removal as the
BIGGEST FACTOR affecting their business success.
If businesses cannot be successful, we all suffer. end