70 Doh!

Now that the temps are creeping back up, albeit temporarily, I feel I can let off a little steam about our wonderful cleanup crews. Oh, you say you only saw them down your road once or twice? Why, you must be mistaken. The state of West Virginia had a budget of over $500 million for this winter. They claimed with the FIRST storm that they spent over 50 million. I suppose with overtime and enough guys watching the few truck drivers that they DO have, fuel and incidentals, they may have actually spent that much. What I'm sure they didnt spend it on was cinders.

A little birdie told me that the stockpile for Kingwood was leftovers from last year and that they hadnt ordered more because they didnt foresee any worse weather than last year. Ok. Where is the money that is alotted for this year's salt/cinders? Why is it that when they do finally get around to plowing a road, there are rarely cinders applied? Dont tell me " they cindered MY road. I dont know what you're talking about." I dont know how many back roads I was on in the last month that when they WERE plowed, it was usually one lane. Yes, it was still snowing and I suppose we should be grateful that they plowed SOMETHING, but if you go DOWN a road, do you not come back UP it? And spread the damned cinders. People do eventually have to go out for whatever reasons: doctor, groceries(it was a 2 or 3 week storm), boredom (we dont want people killing each other because they're stuck together in the house, right?).

I still say that when we were kids and inflation hadnt caused the rampant upswing in costs for men and material, they put cinders down on just about everything they plowed, even if they came back in a couple hours and plowed it again. Simpler times and people still had some simblance of values and respect. I think it may be as simple as that. They knew people either had to or were going to drive on the snowy, icy roads, so they laid down some grit for traction.

I know the state road has usually gotten a bad rap over the years, but for crying out loud, at least make a show of it: WE'RE paying the tab, use the equipment! This past summer, Roz and I were out taking a drive and we went down a back or "secondary" road, we came upon a crew of guys patching potholes. There were 2 guys shovelling patch, one on a roller, one driving the asphalt truck and about 3 standing around watching, one of which appeared to be a supervisor. He was the clean one, in a nice looking, clean uniform. I shouldnt have to paint any more on this picture. We have all seen it.

Okay, I will give them this: it was a blizzard and it was a long one. What I cant abide is that we pay the tab as taxpayers and they seem to be squandering our money somewhere, but surely not at our most desperate hour. Should we be asking someone higher up in the heirarchy why they didnt spend this year's alotted amount on cinders? Last year there was an article in the Dominion Post about the shortage of drivers. Wait, QUALIFIED drivers, to fill the trucks that we all see sitting there. The NEW trucks that seem to appear every couple years. You know, the ones sitting beside the NEW backhoes and such that are there every couple years? Okay, so maybe we're short a few drivers that are capable of running a plow truck. Still, when they do get around to plowing a given road, wouldnt that warrant cindering the crap out of it so they didnt have to come back as soon? or COULDNT come back as soon?

Our facebook friend Sharon Grimes had to wait several days to get her road plowed, and trust me, she lives on one of those BFE roads. She had to make calls and the guy said (paraphrasing) "sucks to be you". He basically said it was her fault for living where she does. Yes, you choose where you live, but she does live on a state maintained road, it's not like she was asking to have her driveway plowed. The Grimes' needed fuel oil delivered and it is understandable that after several days of the delivery guy waiting for the road to get plowed, she was getting ansy. Wouldnt you? What compassion that man showed for a family in need. A family waiting on something important, it's not like they were waiting for the ups man to delivery a new x-box or something. His words have now caused another rift in the community between us and an already poorly-perceived public service. You know? The three guys leaning on a shovel and one working kinda public service? Oh. Right. I already saw that.

I heard tales from a lot of our facebook friends about not getting plowed out for days and I have tried not to be totally negative about the service that we DO have. I'm sure the drivers that we do have, do as much as they can and they more than likely have orders from higher-up(at least locally higher up) about using their fuel and their cinders sparingly. I'm sure it wouldnt have anything to do with BONUSES or anything like that. Right? Surely they dont get BONUSES based on work or time? I wonder if they need a levy or something to be able to NOT skimp on material and men? I'm being a smart-ass because I know that's not how it works, but boy it feels good to be a smart-ass right now.

I usually try to look for a compromise in most of the situations I cover, but I fear there is none here. BIG GUBMENT will do as they please, as usual. Local corruption(yes, I think that's what it amounts to) will control what service we receive and when we receive it. I think on one level, we should be grateful that we get the service at all, but on another, for the taxes we pay(check your WV pay stub) should we not get service based on need? There are about a dozen or so mountainous northern counties that habitually get worse weather(on average) than most of the rest of the state combined. Should Preston or Pocahontas or Tucker counties not get bigger stockpiles of (winter) supplies? It's not like they go bad. Okay, so they didnt use all their cinders from last year, fine. Where did the money go for this year's cinders? Maybe they should have bought half again the amount and then thought about re-allocating what was left.

So, what can we expect next year? What does the Farmer's Almanac have to say? I believe it called this winter as a worse-than-average one. Maybe they should pay more attention to the Almanac than the National Weather Service. I would reference, before I go, surrounding states' tax structure: Maryland-drive to Oakland and look at the difference, Pa-again, take a drive and look. You cant OH-MY-GOD mention raising taxes here because people lose their freaking minds. I would pose to you that small increases provide much-needed revenue (for what, who knows?) BUT, infrastructure brings JOBS people! We get better roads, better service in the winter and businesses become more likely to settle here.

I'm still pissed about the roads NOW, dont get me wrong. You and I deserve better. Accountability is a big word and maybe it should be examined a little closer, even here in Podunk, USA.