Warm winter last year led to $2.5M surplus in Sudbury’s snow removal budget

Staff in Greater Sudbury launched a new snow plowing status map to keep residents informed with real time updates on winter maintenance. Lyndsay Aelick has more

The warm winter of 2024 may have been bad news for snowmobilers and skiers, but it was great news for Sudbury’s snow removal budget.

With snowfall well below average in five winter months, the city was able to post a surplus of $2.519 million out of a budget of $25,607,516.

Normally, the city receives 67.9 cm of snow in February, but last year just 33.10 cm fell, a drop of 51.3 per cent. And only 19.3 cm fell in March 2024, exactly half of the normal amount. Very little snow fell in October and November’s 20.10 cm was almost half of what we normally get.

For the full year, snowfall was 20.6 per cent less than the 10-year average. The winter control budget now boasts a $3,955,000 accumulated surplus with a target surplus of just more than $10 million.

And for the current winter of 2024-2025, the city has a $526,476 surplus as of Dec. 31.

The full report on the snow removal budget, which was part of Monday’s operations committee meeting, can be found here.