Mayoral Candidates Plan to Identify Snow Removal Problems

Mayoral candidate Cyndi Lamm issued a press release Friday suggesting a task force to examine Lincoln’s snow removal policy. In a statement issued prior to last weekend’s storm, Mayoral candidate Jeff Kirkpatrick also called for the City to re-examine it’s snow removal operations.

Lamm has announced that she is working on a resolution to create a Task Force on Snow Removal. She will submit the resolution to city law for final formatting by Monday.

“Clearly, recent snow removal has not been what is expected by our citizens, and this is not a new problem,” said Lamm.

Lamm’s Snow Removal Task Force would include two citizens from each city council district, a member representing both the police and fire departments, a member representing the PAGE workers who are the boots on the ground for snow removal, members representing the business community, the Mayor’s Office, the City Council, and a member from the Transportation and Utilities Department snow removal process.

“Recent snow events that have crippled Lincoln’s traffic have raised many questions about current practices and how decisions are made,” said Lamm, “there is no time like the present to take steps to reevaluate current policies and protocol.”

Kirkpatrick clarified what his approach would be as Mayor on Friday.

“City Council members are elected to implement and re-evaluate City policies. Issuing a task force for snow removal isn’t a bad idea coming from a current City Council member. However, being Mayor requires a decisive approach. As Mayor, I will call in the Transportation and Utilities team. We will discuss our current approach and why it wasn’t adequate to deal with the storm that we were hit with last weekend. Then, we will walk through our options, how much each option will cost, and what changes need to made. This is an operational issue, not a task force issue. We need a better response to unusual storms.”

For more information: Two Candidates For Mayor Criticizing The City For Its Snow Removal Efforts