Director of Public Works, Mark Roetzer, presents the department budget for the Department of Public Works and Parks department to the city council. Screenshot courtesy of the city of Jamestown’s website

The cost of road salt will be going up in next year’s Public Works Department budget.

Mark Roetzer, interim public works director, said from last winter to this winter the price of salt has increased 41% from $49 to $69 per ton, which he noted to be a county-wide increase.

“That’s a substantial increase for us,” Roetzer said. “The account went up to help accommodate for that, but we as a department requested more than that, but this is what we were allocated.”

When it comes to buying salt, Roetzer said the department requests a certain tonnage of salt and they are required to use at least 50% of it with the option to use up to 130% of it. Depending on how the winter is determines how much salt is actually used.

Salaries in the DPW engineering department budget are staying about the same, and Roetzer added they are still looking for one more engineer to replace someone who moved out of the department.

“A lot of the rest of this particular budget has stayed flat,” Roetzer said. “We had a charge for a plotter in this account that was removed and you’ll be voting on tonight for the engineering department as our plotter has failed and can’t be replaced.”

The engineering department budget also includes salaries for Roetzer, the administrative assistant and the three engineers the department has on staff. It also includes utilities and associated computer programs and subscriptions.

An increase in the utilities amount was discussed, then Roetzer moved onto the city hall budget account page. This section also includes an increase in utilities and for the maintenance section Roetzer said they broke out the custodial services for city hall at a contract price, and that building maintenance for the three ramps is also included in a separate line item.

“Last year was the first year we actually broke those out; they used to just be in the city hall budget,” Roetzer said. “But we noticed a lot more charges in those accounts so we broke them out last year and we went over budget in two of the three of them so we increased those.”

Other basic maintenance items come out of these accounts such as elevator inspections, snow removal, and dealing with vandalism, which Roetzer said there has been before. Roetzer then moved on to discussing the fleet department down on Washington Street, highlighting items for that one such as fuel and equipment and parts.

“Ever since 2017, 2018 the fleet department has really grown,” Roetzer said. “We’ve done a lot of work for the other departments in the city. It used to solely be the mechanics for the parks department and DPW, but since that time they’ve spent a lot of time on whether it’s BPU equipment, fire equipment, police, so that’s what that number is and that gets passed through to those other departments.”

Roetzer then talked about the department’s maintenance of streets account, talking about maintenance items and items funded through CHIPS funding, along with an increase in expenses for chemicals used for daily operations and building maintenance increases for both buildings used by the fleet.

Looking at the traffic division, Roetzer said the amount for the changes to the alternate parking signs were included in the 2025 budget, so it is not in the 2026 budget, so that amount is lower than last year and the budget for that division is mostly flat. Roetzer then discussed the leaf collection account, which begins next Monday in the city, and street lighting, before moving into the parks department budget. The parks department includes allocations in salaries for snow and ice control, tree trimming, and the stadium. While utilities for this department will be increasing like the others, Roetzer said the budget will remain mostly flat. Roetzer highlighted the flags and banners section of the account along with the horticultural expenses. In the more miscellaneous items section, he highlighted the need to replace some Christmas decorations that he said are starting to get worn down, and some other big items to come out of that account.

The tree maintenance account, which Roetzer said is looking to replace some chainsaws, the city recreational account, and the account for the stadium at Russell E. Diethrick, Jr. Park, used for the Babe Ruth World Series were all then discussed. A lot of extra manpower, time and cost goes into this stadium during a World Series year, Roetzer said, and there are some larger items there in need of replacing.

Roetzer followed that with the account for the Band Shell concerts, special programming which includes the Historical Marker program in the city, the storm sewers account, sliplining, and engineering costs for the Chadakoin Channel Maintenance Project. He added he hopes to have permits in place by spring to be able to do that work.

The big item in that account, Roetzer said, is the match for the Middlebrook Culvert Construction project.

“The city of Jamestown got a $1.5 million grant through Bridge New York to replace the Middlebrook Culvert which is off of Water Street,” Roetzer said. “The estimate for that project is about $1.8 million, so the city is responsible for the difference after that. Whatever the project costs after that $1.5 million the city is responsible for.”

Roetzer then went over the street cleaning account and the capital account. The capital account includes all of the equipment that the DPW and Parks department has, which a lot of that is past the date when it should have been replaced. Roetzer noted that this equipment cannot be bought with CHIPS money.

“So it is always important for us to continue as much as we can to fund equipment purchases through the city’s budget,” Roetzer said.

The capital budget also includes tree inventory and HVAC controls for city hall, the DPW building and Parks department building, something else he noted is in desperate need of replacement. Funding for equipment replacement was discussed a little bit more by council before Roetzer wrapped up his budget presentation.