By Emily Randall
Northeast News
Jan. 6, 2010

Shovels, snow blowers and plows were out in full force this December.

It was a record month for snow in Kansas City. According to the National Weather Service, Kansas City saw 15.1 inches of snow, the third highest total amount of snow for the month of December ever recorded. The highest was 16.6 inches in 1961.

In the period from Christmas Eve through Wednesday when two snowstorms struck the city, 10.6 inches of snow fell. The month had nine days of measurable snow — nearly a third of December. This is also a higher than average occurrence, as in an average year only 4.3 inches of snow falls in December.

January also started off snowy with 5 inches of the white stuff over the weekend. The average snowfall for the entire month of January is 5.8 inches.

The snow has brought challenges to the Kansas City Public Works Department and 3-1-1 Action Center.

Action Center Operations Manager Jean Ann Lawson said as of this past Wednesday afternoon, the action center had recorded more than 7,000 calls since the storm had begun, and the calls were still coming in steadily New Year’s Eve.

Compared to other storms since the Action Center’s formation in 2007, Lawson said this was an unusual event.

“This has definitely been the most intense and prolonged that we’ve had to deal with,” she said. “We’re just trying to keep our head above water.”

She said common calls into 3-1-1 included residents’ saying the plow missed their street, their driveways were blocked, and asking when the trucks would plow their streets and if their sidewalks could be plowed.

“We really cannot specifically say, ‘Oh, I see the route should be at your house by late afternoon,’” Lawson said. “We don’t have the GPS tracking system that would allow us to provide that information. That would be nice.”

Luckily for the Action Center, 12 additional helpers have been around for the recent storms. The trainees, whom the center trains in customer service skills at no expense to the city through a job training program, allowed the call center staff to continue their normal operations without using overtime.

Lawson said for future storms, Kansas City residents should keep in mind that when they call 3-1-1, it doesn’t mean a truck is immediately dispatched to their area. The Action Center forwards information to Public Works, and that department compiles addresses until they can complete a route to assign. It could take 10 minutes or several hours.

The Public Works Department was also strapped during the storms, with crews working 12- and 14-hour shifts around the clock from Christmas Eve to New Year’s Eve. Although many citizens were frustrated with the slow service clearing their residential streets, Assistant City Engineer Greg Bolon said trucks were hitting every street. The sheer volume of snow, however, meant it took several passes to clear the snow down to pavement.

During this latest storm, city crews opted not to plow the fresh snow on Sunday along residential streets, which would have exposed underlying ice. Instead, according to a city statement, the new snow would provide better traction.

Mayor Mark Funkhouser said the city was not equipped to deal with back-to-back snowstorms. The mayor blamed that situation on the city’s failure to keep up with equipment maintenance in the past and cutting staff.

“We haven’t invested what we should have over the years with people and equipment,” Funkhouser said.

Looking ahead, he called for smarter investing in people and equipment, however he added this storm was not reason enough to “radically change policy.”

He added that another big snow event this winter would cause problems for Kansas City.

“If we get back-to-back storms like this, we’re going to have to look at reserve funds,” he said.

The National Weather Service was predicting the new trend in the first weeks of the new decade to be extremely cold temperatures brought on by artic high pressure. Highs this week in the teens and lows in the single digits with wind chill readings possibly as low as 10 or 15 degrees below zero were forecast.

The average temperatures for this time of year are 36 degrees as a high and lows around 18 degrees.

The NWS was calling for a 70 percent chance of snow again Wednesday, with a high temperature of 20 degrees.

TOP: Jean Felix shovels snow off his driveway on Smart Street in Historic Northeast this past Wednesday following an overnight snowfall. ABOVE: Gladstone Boulevard was plowed but still slick Sunday afternoon. Photos by Emily Randall