The Mother Nature Contingency

[Roy N.]

Mother Nature ... gotta love her!

In the past 10-days we've received 36+ inches of snow, which is above normal for this early in the winter (Jan & Feb are usually the big snow months). In addition to the snow, we received about 36hrs of freezing rain on he 22nd & 23rd which put a 1/2" layer of ice on the snow that was already down.

The ice sidelined three blowers from our snow removal service {I think someone was using regular 5/16" bolts and not shear pins} and put them hopelessly behind on snow removal ... to the point where we had to bring in someone else to get the job done.

Across our multi-units, each snowfall represents $175 in snow removal charges (our student houses are responsible for their own snow removal) based on actuals from past years, we budget $500/mth from December to April for snow removal. We are already 50% over budget for December and another 6" are forecast for Monday :-|

At this rate, we're on a curve for a 4-5K winter ... yet another reason you need to maintain adequate contingencies!