Road Salt Management

MichaelB1: You want to ensure that the contractor is using a calcium cloride product which does not impair your road surface as regular road salt does. You could investigate with your local municipality office as to what product they use and where they purchase it.

Further, suggestions to reduce costs--
- initiate a 2" or 3" snow rule, in that, no snow removal will be completed unless the snow is more than 2-3", whatever you decide.
- consider how the sun moves and that some of the ice and light snow will melt
- encourage (request strongly) residents to maintain a bag of calcium chloride in their garage for applying to their driveways
- network with other communities in your area to learn how their snow contracts read

Good Luck!

Mike,
We don't have a snow problem but I did live in Maryland for a lot of years.
Just a couple notes:

Is the job put out on bids?
Do you have it broken down into labor, salt, etc.
I know this from living in Maryland, winters are unpredictable and that should show up in you snow removal contract. Go back and look at past bills and see if the don't have huge differences year to year, they should.
Check this guys license, see if he is certifed to lay down salt on roads and his equipmet is proper.
Negioiate!!!!!!!!
The other suggestions by Paul above sound good to me.

See if you don't have wiggle room in the contract. He may accept a standard yearly fee that might work out better for you when you look at back bills. You are and should be concerned that only enough salt is laid down to do the job, no more.

MichaelB1: It is wise of you to ask for additional snow contracts, and in doing so, have them bid on the exact same services you are now receiving. In this way, you will have an 'apples to apples' comparison and can better understand what you are getting (or not getting) for your money.

Its interesting that the cost of salt seems to be hurting you more than the snow removal. That may be cause for concern. All the more reason to check elsewhere on the salt product, as well as the amount they will put down, as well as the ice-situation/s and when YOU want them to apply salt. Is it possible the contractor is using an inferior or incorrect salt product and is using more of it to accomplish the task?

The entire community snow removal/salt scenario is very strange to me. Don't know why community residents seem to believe that 'their' portion of the street should be cleaned immediately upon their departure for work, or their appt. or whatever. It's a 'me me' world we live in!!!

One other suggestion, be diligent to interpret what your docs state re
association responsibility for landscaping and snow maintenance. Residents seem to have different interpretations on the level of maintenance which needs to be done (actually, what they in their mind thought would be done for them...) and what the terms 'adequate' and 'will maintain' mean. Again, its trying to find a solution which is reasonable and still within the association restrictions, while spending the funds wisely. It's a tall order indeed!

I know this is an old post, but I think it is still relevant today. I'm a fairly new board member and I'm also finding that our snow vendor charges $25/50lb bag even though Lowes or other places sell them for $6 a 50lb bag. Recently they started charging bulk rates and started charging $300 per ton of rock salt. They routinely charges us 2 to 3 tons of rock salt used even though we only have about 2 miles roadway in our community. I did some calling around to other vendors and they all seem to evade answering direct pricing questions. I think the snow vendors all know HOAs are good source of business for them and they don't want to change that. Thoughts?

This is an old thread.

AIS has started a new thread on the same topic. Please list replies on the new thread:

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