Robinson, Marsilio

After spill, water ban lifted for part of W.Va.

First Posted: 2/19/2014 PITTSTON &#8211; The city has used nearly 325 tons of rock salt on city roads this winter.
That&#8217;s how much the city is allotted each year by a contract with the state&#8217;s COSTARS program. The city can still get an additional 140 tons at the state rate for the balance of the winter, said City Administrator Joe Moskovitz at Pittston Council&#8217;s monthly meeting Wednesday night.
COSTARS is a cooperative purchasing program administered by the state Department of General Services that allows the state to purchase equipment or supplies, such as rock salt, in bulk at the best possible price.
Geographically, the city is small. It&#8217;s 1.75 miles and there are 17-18 miles of roadways the city must maintain. That doesn&#8217;t include major thoroughfares such as Main, Broad, William, Swallow, Mill streets, Columbus Avenue and Kennedy Boulevard, which the state maintains.
&#8220;If storms keep coming back to back to back like they have been, we&#8217;ll go over our ordered allotment,&#8221; Moskovitz said. He said the city would then have to buy salt at market price, which is significantly higher than the rate the state gets, $57.43 a ton.
Moskovitz said it&#8217;s been a tough winter, but he&#8217;s not overly alarmed.
&#8220;Even in years where we&#8217;re at the high end of our utilization in terms of winter maintenance requirements, we&#8217;re still in the ballpark,&#8221; Moskovitz said. &#8220;It&#8217;s not off the chart.&#8221;
He said the city&#8217;s Department of Public Works has already used all the overtime money available in the budget allotted to winter maintenance, which is 40 percent. So far $5,000 in overtime has been paid out of $8,000 for the entire year.
&#8220;We&#8217;re going to need to make adjustments in the public works department line items,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Which is going to mean there may be less infrastructure projects that we would have done, catch basin repair/replacement, or capital purchases that we otherwise may have made.&#8221;
He&#8217;s concerned about the heavy use of city equipment. He said the city must spend $2,500 on a new welder because the city&#8217;s is not repairable. It&#8217;s used heavily to maintain the snow plows and salt spreaders.
Moskovitz saluted the city&#8217;s DPW crew and DPW Superintendent Sam Valenti and his assistant Bruce Widdick for clearing the piled-up snow in the downtown Tuesday. The DPW department is down a full-time employee because one was recently fired.
In other business:
&#8226; The city appointed two new part-time officers, Brian Kuchinski of Avoca and Joseph Benson of Nuangola. One will replace a longtime, part-time officer Maivaun Houssein, who was recently hired as a full-time officer with the Wilkes-Barre Police Department.
&#8226; Councilman Danny Argo complained some sidewalks in front of businesses along Kennedy Boulevard and Dock Street were not cleared of snow. Code enforcement officials have spoken to representatives of the businesses and demanded the walks be cleared as soon as possible.
&#8226; In the code enforcement report, Moskovitz said 37 permits were issued and $10,556 in fees was collected. He compared those figures to the same time last year, when the city issued 13 permits and $2,076 was collected. He also said seven rental inspections were made as part of the city&#8217;s rental inspection ordinance and $441 was collected.
&#8220;This demonstrates the commitment the city has to the neighborhoods,&#8221; he said.
&#8226; Chief James Rooney asked residents to clear snow from fire hydrants in front of their homes.
&#8226; The sewer project on Mill Street is nearly complete. Moskovitz said the contractors will return in the spring to re-pave the street.
&#8226; City property tax bills for 2014 have been mailed out. The rebate period expires on April 9 and face period expires on June 9.
&#8226; The Greater Pittston St. Patrick&#8217;s Parade is set for noon March 8.

Pittston’s salt use so far almost 325 tons