This is a difficult issue--the snow clearing, if it were to happen during daylight hours, would have a deleterious effect on businesses, and potentially become a safety issue for school children, the elderly, and others. Rather than the time of day, I might suggest the discussion should be more about the location of the dumping. Certainly when that lot gets developed, this problem will be moved to another location. Perhaps we can all participate in that debate, and find the best possible place to handle excess snow that balances cost and efficiency concerns with the impact on residents.

I understand that snow removal must take place but I do not agree that it needs to take place from 11 P.M. till 5 A.M. There are very few Downtown businesses open after 7 P.M. They could very easily have done the snow removal from 7 P.M. till 11 P.M. and people could still have gotten a decent nights sleep. Plus not to mention 90% of the noise was just a tractor plowing an empty lot. There is not going to be a need for that much space to place snow. That tractor did not need to plowing that whole lot all night with its back up alarm going off all night. If there is a need for that much space there is no reason they could not have plowed that lot at a reason time where they were not keeping everyone awake.

The City does not have a policy of hauling snow after each and every storm. However, it is advisable to collect snow off certain streets when the snow banks get too high or the streets gets too narrow so that motorist and pedestrian safety is at risk. Attention is focused on the streets located in the immediate downtown area where parking, traffic volume and speed, intersections, and parking lots require attention. In order to do this operation safely, efficiently and effectively, it has to be done at night when traffic and pedestrians are at a minimum. The snow dump area off Dutton Street is the closest location we have to the downtown. Using it allows us to be as efficient and effective as possible in a limited amount of time. I understand that the noise can be annoying and I apologize for it, but I don’t have much choice. The lot is getting pretty full and the winter is getting close to its end, so I am hoping we do not have to do much , if any, more nighttime snow removal this year.