By Walter Pryce
This is an opinion column. It reflects the views of the writer.
Buffalo’s new snow plan makes a promise that every resident can understand: at least one plow pass on every residential street within 24 hours after a snow event ends.
That is the right promise. The problem is that nobody outside City Hall will be able to tell whether it was kept. The Common Council should fix that before the first big lake-effect band of the season, by requiring the city to publish a simple report card after every major storm.
The city has spent the money
Give Mayor Sean Ryan’s administration credit where it is due. The plan he released Oct. 22 puts $2.7 million into contracted snow removal, up $2.12 million from $580,000. It buys tractors built for narrow streets, upgrades the GPS tracking on city equipment, lines up at least 25,000 tons of salt and adds Parking Department staff and tow trucks to clear cars out of the way.
“Buffalo residents deserve reliable service on their streets, and being better prepared for winter is a big part of fixing the basics,” Ryan said in announcing it.
Public Works Commissioner Nolan Skipper was blunter at the equipment showcase on Oct. 30. “This is a huge investment to put real equipment in the streets when the snow is hitting, and not be days behind on the side streets,” he told Buffalo Toronto Public Media. As the Chronicle reported Saturday, the side streets are where this winter will be judged.
Last winter showed why a report card matters
Buffalo has already been through one argument over whether the plows did their job, and it went nowhere because there was no shared yardstick.
After the storms in early February, Ryan told WBEN, “We had the best storm response we’ve done in over five years.” North District Council Member Joseph Golombek Jr. saw something else. “Every side street was a disaster, because there were cars on both sides of the street,” he told the station.
Golombek made the same point to WKBW: “It was not a good job in Black Rock and Riverside.” The city’s own plow tracker, which launched in January and colors streets by how recently a plow passed, showed most of the city green and some streets red.
Both men could have been partly right. A live map tells you about your own block at one moment. It does not tell the public how the whole city did, which neighborhoods waited longest, or whether things are getting better from one storm to the next.
Even the basic facts can drift. The Oct. 22 plan announcement counted five new tractors. News reports from the Oct. 30 showcase, including WBEN’s, counted seven. That may have a simple explanation, but it is a reminder that a promise is only as good as the numbers that back it up.
What the Council should require
The city already collects what it needs. The plan says the upgraded GPS system records when service was last logged on each street. Turning that into a public scorecard is a reporting job, not a new program.
Within a week of any storm the city declares a snow event, DPW should post three numbers: the share of residential streets that got at least one plow pass within 24 hours after the snow stopped, the same share broken out by each of the nine Council districts, and the number of streets still unserved at 48 hours. It should add the tickets written and cars towed, since blocked streets are part of the story.
The Council should also put the plan back on a schedule the city actually keeps. The charter requires an annual snow plan. After the 2022 blizzard, the Council moved the deadline from Nov. 1 to April 1 so the city would plan earlier. Plans were filed on time in 2024 and 2025, WGRZ reported. This year’s arrived more than 200 days late, according to WKBW. A late plan should come with a written explanation to the Council and a date it will be delivered.
The fair objection
The strongest case against a scorecard is that Buffalo weather does not grade on a curve. The plan itself says continuing snow, extreme conditions and parked cars can delay service. Deputy Mayor Benjamin Swanekamp has warned that when snow falls faster than three inches an hour, “it is impossible to keep up with them with traditional plows,” BTPM reported. Officials also worry that a bad number after a freak storm will be used as a political club.
That is a real concern, and the answer is context, not silence. The report can note snowfall totals, how long the event lasted and how many streets were blocked by parked cars. A storm that dumps four feet in a day will look different from a six-inch Tuesday, and residents know the difference. What they cannot see today is the pattern across storms and across neighborhoods.
A scorecard also protects the people doing the work. If the new tractors and contractors deliver, the numbers will show it, and the administration will have proof instead of competing anecdotes.
What to do now
Administration officials have said they will meet with the Council on the plan in the coming weeks. That is the moment. Council members should ask DPW to commit, in writing, to a post-storm report with the district-by-district 24-hour figure, and then write that requirement and a late-plan explanation rule into the city’s snow plan ordinance before winter is over.
Residents can help by calling or emailing their district Council member this week and asking a single question: after the next storm, will we see how many streets got plowed in 24 hours? The city has bought the equipment. Now it should show its work.
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