CEDAR RAPIDS - The ongoing snow and ice in the winter of 2009-2010 is already straining the streets department budget in Cedar Rapids. And with another large storm expected, things won’t get better soon.

But so far, removing much more snow and ice this winter than expected won’t impact other street repair or road projects later in the year.

Craig Hanson, Cedar Rapids Public Works Maintenance Manager, said one bright spot is the significant increase in the city’s budget for salt and sand compared to several winters ago. This winter, Hanson said the city has $820,000 in the budget for chemicals that include the salt to melt snow and ice on roads. So far, he’s spent about a half million dollars of that. Hanson said he got a good deal on salt earlier last year and bought a considerable supply at $66.49 per ton. If he had to go out and buy extra salt now, at current premium prices, the city would be spending approximately $100 to $140 a ton.

Hanson said he won’t know if he’ll need to buy any salt at inflated mid-winter prices. He can still get 4,600 tons at the cheaper price. That will depend on how bad the weather remains the rest of the season.

It’s a different story, though, for the overtime budget to remove snow and ice for streets. The city budgets for approximately $100,000 worth of hours of overtime. So far, Hanson said workers have used 3,800 hours. That’s well over budget, but he won’t know the dollar amount until workers decide between extra pay or comp time later.

Hanson has requested funds from other areas of the city budget to pay for the overtime. He’s expecting about $100,000 to be transferred from other capital improvement projects that went under budget. At this point, paying the extra cost of winter will not meaning delaying or eliminating projects planned for later in the year. However, Hanson said if he has to budget for another 2,000 hours of overtime beyond what’s already overspent, then he might have to recommend putting some road repair or other work on hold.

Last year, the city spent approximately $215,000 on overtime for snow removal. The year before, when winter was even worse, cost a bit over $400,000.

Hanson said one thing that can really bust a budget is needing to remove snow mounds, or windrows, from downtown streets with workers on overtime. That is about a $20,000 a night event. So far this winter, he’s had to do that twice. The other times, workers on overnight shifts who didn’t need to plow were able to work on downtown windrows without using overtime help.