Jason Arndt jarndt@wolfrivermedia.com
Some Wisconsin counties are paying as much as 14 percent more for road salt this year due to increased demand driven by last year’s record snowfall and sub-zero temperatures.
The winter budget outlook is a little better in Shawano County, where highway department officials say prices have gone up about 8 percent. The city of Shawano, meanwhile, is paying about 10.7 percent more per ton than a year ago.
Shawano County purchases its salt from the state, which has a contract with Cargill. The county buys 6,000 tons annually. The Shawano Public Works Department gets 1,400 tons.
The city of Shawano will pay $78.25 per ton of salt, $7.60 more than a year ago, said Eddie Sheppard, assistant city administrator and public works coordinator.
Grant Bystol, Shawano County highway commissioner, said the county will pay $7 more per ton this year compared to last year, when the price was $70 per ton.
“When supply is down, demand is up, but we will be OK,” Bystol said.
Bystol and Sheppard are hopeful the winter will be less severe than the previous two. The back-to-back harsh winters drained salt reserves and budgets more quickly than usual.
“We are hoping for less snow this year,” Sheppard said.
Sheppard said the city used 1,015 tons of salt last year, up from 941 in 2012-13.
The county used 5,500 tons of salt last year — 300 tons more than in 2012-13, Bystol said.
“We typically use about the same each year,” he said. “If it is a severe winter, we will use more salt/sand mix on our roads to stretch our salt supply through the winter.”
The highway department tapped cash reserves to pay for a 20 percent budget overrun in 2013 and cut back on its summer road projects. The county remains on track for this year, however.
“It looks like we will be OK if we have a mild November and December,” Bystol said.
The county has 2,000 tons of salt available for November and December and $125,000 remaining in its snow removal budget, which totals $950,000 annually.
Shawano has used $44,959 of its $68,000 2014 snow removal budget. Sheppard said Friday that the city’s proposed 2015 budget has $76,000 earmarked for road salt and sand.
“We are usually done with snow removal by the end of March, but in 2014 we went to nearly the end of April,” Sheppard said.
Faced with rising prices and dwindling supplies last winter, some municipalities across the state mixed sand with road salt to conserve the supply.
The county highway department uses the salt/sand mixture for 65 percent of county highways, Bystol said, with salt reserved for roads with the highest average daily traffic.
Salt for state highways in the county is kept in separate sheds and paid for by the state. Salt purchased through the state is delivered by truck, all at once. The county has already received its 2015 allocation.
Prices and supplies vary across the state.
The price in Manitowoc County, for example, went up from $55 per ton to $63 per ton — 14.5 percent — over the last year.
In the western portion of the state, Chippewa County’s contract price for salt is $75.67 per ton.
The current marker for municipalities without a contract is more than $100 per ton, according to a recent report to the county board there.