The Municipality of Chatham-Kent is looking at improving snow removal on sidewalks for next winter and beyond.
If changes are approved at the council meeting on Monday night, administration said it will return to council with the required by-law amendments and financial implications of "minor improvements" that can be made for the 2026-2027 winter and into the future.
According to staff, one approach to increasing the level of service would be to keep the same approach with a by-law requiring residents to salt adjacent sidewalks, but expand the downtown business areas to a much larger priority network.
Public Works currently removes snow and salts sidewalks in downtown business areas and removes snow on all other sidewalks within 48 hours when there's more than eight centimetres of accumulation. Residents adjacent to all other sidewalks are also required to salt and/or sand the sidewalk to treat ice or face a fine.
A staff report showed the cost of delivering this service for the past three years was $651,143 last year, $203,383 the previous year, and $313,314 in 2023.
Staff noted the municipality has 410 kilometres (km) of sidewalks and it costs an average of $300 per km for plowing and $350 per km for plowing and salting.
"The majority of sidewalks are concentrated in the communities of Chatham and Wallaceburg. The contracted rates in Erieau, for example, are many times higher than Chatham due to equipment mobilization costs and fewer sidewalks," the report stated.
The municipality said it normally plows between two and 10 times per year. However, that number would jump to 20-40 times per year if ice was to be treated as is the case in Chatham's core.
