The Province of Manitoba and the City of Dauphin have once again come to terms with regards to snow clearing on provincially-owned roads in the community.

Mike VanAlstyne, director of Public Works and Operations, said the province approached Dauphin with a lump sum offer of $50,000 to provide winter maintenance on the urban highway system after several years with no agreement in place. The streets in question include Main Street, Second Avenue Northwest and First Avenue Northeast.

“The Province approach us a few months ago to start discussions about it and they were able to offer, or come up with a new calculation for how much municipalities should get,” VanAlstyne said, adding city council approved the deal at its Nov. 27 regular meeting. “We felt that this was more fair than previous offers had been. And we know that we can provide probably a better level of service than they can at the moment, just with their staff levels and some challenges they’re facing.”

VanAlstyne added the winter maintenance will still take a team approach with plenty of communication between the two levels of government.

“The Manitoba government has offered to continue the sanding and salting services, so the ice control stuff, and we’re going to take on more of the plowing. We’re just able to prioritize it better than they can with their set levels of service,” VanAlstyne said. “Their set levels of service is lower than they probably should be, and where they would want them to be from a community of our size, but they have to follow their policies. So this is where the opportunity is there for us to recover most of our costs and to provide everyone with a better level of service.”

The end result should be easier passage on some of the main routes in the heart of the city, VanAlstyne added.

“The hope is that we can provide everyone with a better level of service than the previous few years,” he said, adding it is still unclear whether the $50,000 sum will fully cover the costs. “We’ll have to wait and see, I guess it depends on the winter. Right now, financially, we’re enjoying the warm weather and the lack of snow, but that could turn around quick on us. We’ll have to see how it plays out.”

VanAlstyne added that putting the provincially-owned roads back into the snow clearing mix should not adversely affect the level of service in other parts of the city.

“I don’t think it will be too bad. Our priority routes and our emergency routes and school routes will all still remain a priority, as well as our sidewalks and whatnot around the schools. We plan to address everything the same as we have,” he said. “The residential streets might see a 12-hour delay compared to where they used to be, but I don’t think it’s going to be a burden on the community. If those main arteries are opened up, we should see a lot of relief.”