Paul Szmal: FLX Morning continues, it is 22 sunny outside our Geneva studios, 20 in Auburn this morning where Chuck Mason, the city clerk, is standing by. Chuck, were you spared most of the effects of the lake effect monster in Auburn?
Chuck Mason: We actually had snow overnight, but not a large amount of snow, but probably about three inches of snow last night. It's definitely been a very cold and snowy start to the winter, November and now December. So you know, I guess we'll deal with it, but there is a little break in next week's forecast with some higher temperatures coming in, but definitely been a snowy week over here on the Auburn side of the Finger Lakes.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, and I don't know if you would call this irony or appropriate timing, but keeping with the theme of the light agenda that we've had for city council meetings the past couple of weeks, one real item of note last night at the meeting was a snowplow presentation.
Chuck Mason: That's right, and we usually time, this is an annual presentation that we will have our Department of Public Works Superintendent Mike Talbot will come before the council annually to give us an update on the snow plowing policy in the city of Auburn because it's, you know, once you get to this time of year, it's something that everybody's talking about and everybody has questions about. But we put as much information as possible, in fact, probably about all of the information that goes behind the strategy for snowplow removal in the city is put into this presentation. Everything from the amount of roots, the plows, the pictures of the equipment, and how much a storm event will cost. And we, you know, we put it all out there for the public annually. So we usually do time it if it's been a warm start to the winter, we'll maybe hold this presentation off till January, but since Mother Nature jumped right into things this year, we decided we better get this presentation out there.
So Mike went through things last night and did an overall review of what the snow removal budget for the city of Auburn is. This year we're just a little bit over $305,000 total that's specifically dedicated to the snow plow. The city's divided into 16 different individual plow routes. And there's, so that requires, you know, 16 pieces of equipment. Mike went through the different size trucks that are used for the different size routes. And each one of those 16 routes, Paul, takes about four hours to get through.
So the, as well, in addition to the city streets in Auburn, the city does have a sidewalk plow that gets out there for some of the main routes, like the arterial and Grant Avenue area of our city. And a lot of times the snow plow for sidewalks will be out there a couple of days straight after a snow event, trying to get through all of the sidewalk areas. Now we fully admit that we're not able to get out there immediately on sidewalks after these snow events, but we do get out there. We do have this sidewalk plow piece of equipment that does get out there. And we usually try to get to the areas within a couple of weeks.
And as Mike Talbot stated numerous times last night, for people in the community that have questions or have concerns about the snow plowing, feel free to be calling the Department of Public Works directly. The staff that's down there during business hours is more than happy to handle things as well as on our city's website, Paul. We have a form for streets and reporting a pothole, and that's the form that can be used for any issue pertaining to snow plowing. The Department of Public Works get those email messages that come in from our website directly and they deal with things immediately once they come in. So if a message comes in overnight, they're usually out there first thing in the morning, the next morning.
But it was another very informative night with Mike Talbot, and the community can expect great service from our Department of Public Works during these winter months. Mike also recognized a lot of his staff. He's had some staff members that have not missed a call in for snow plow removal for four or five years straight here. And we thank all of our dedicated Department of Public Works employees for all the work that they do. It's stressful behind a snow plow, especially when you're in a situation on city streets where there's vehicular traffic and parked cars and pedestrian traffic. There's a lot to be looking out for, but we really appreciate everything that they do.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, it is not an easy job for sure. We wanted to talk about a holiday traditions event that is coming up too.
Chuck Mason: That's right. Our city's Historic and Cultural Sites Commission annually presents a holiday traditions open house event, and that this year is being held this weekend on Sunday, December 14th. All of Auburn's Historic and Cultural Sites will be open roughly between the hours of noon and four or five o'clock. We encourage you to check the City of Auburn's website for all the information and specific details. We also have all of our city social media pages are loaded up with this information for this weekend.
But it's a great chance to get out, see the sites that are decorated for the holidays, such as the Seward House Museum. This whole concept of open house holiday traditions kind of started many, many years ago with the Seward House. The Seward House started this tradition, and in the last 15, 20 years, all the other Historic and Cultural Sites in Auburn have joined in and coordinated the effort. So there's lots to do in Auburn this Sunday. At any of our Historical and Cultural Sites, Willard Memorial Chapel, Cuyuga Museum of Art and History, Schweinfurth Memorial Arts Center, the New York State Equal Rights Heritage Center, the Seward House Museum, the Ward-O'Hara Agricultural Museum as well up at the Emerson Park will be participating, and they have the Festival of Trees going on up there.
And then there's some special concerts involved as well. The Auburn Chamber Orchestra will be holding a concert at 2 p.m. at the Auburn High School Auditorium, and then at the St. Francis Church on 303 Clark Street in Auburn at 5 o'clock, there will be a concert performed by the Stardusters All-Star Band. So lots and all of these activities are free, each one of these sites. The main sites, especially Seward House, Heritage Center, Willard Chapel, the Schweinfurth Arts Center, they also all have really nice gift shops and the Taste New York markets at the Heritage Center as well. And then when you're out and about, you can also do some shopping at some of the stores that may be open in downtown Auburn, so it's a great opportunity to get some last-minute shopping done as well as experiencing our Historic and Cultural Sites for the holidays.
Paul Szmal: With Christmas and New Year's falling on consecutive Thursdays, that would mean then that next week is the final council meeting for the year?
Chuck Mason: Next week's the final council meeting of the year, Paul, as well as, thank you, you give me a little segue here to plug the fact that we will be on a special trash schedule in the city for those final two weeks as well, and that special trash schedule will follow the same schedule that we just had for Thanksgiving, where the Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday people will be one-day early pickup. So the final council meeting of the year is next week, and then we will convene on New Year's Day, 12 p.m. noon, for a ceremonial meeting. No business can happen on that day, but for ceremonial purposes, we will swear in the new members of City Council, our re-elected member Terry Cuddy, and newly elected member Craig Diego. Those two will be sworn in to office to take their oaths of office at a special ceremony at 12 p.m. noon on New Year's Day. So Paul, you and I will have a couple weeks off. We'll be back next week, but then we'll have a couple weeks off and we'll reconvene in the new year.
Paul Szmal: All right. Sounds good. We will talk to you next Friday, Chuck.
Chuck Mason: Paul, thanks a lot. Have a great weekend, everybody.
Paul Szmal: Yep. It is 8.51 on FLX Morning.
