BY ADAM ATKINSON
North Country This Week
POTSDAM — A series of ill-timed breakdowns recently which led to the village having only one working plow truck during a recent storm has led trustees and the mayor to support buying an extra truck now rather than wait.
“We are currently awaiting financial approval on our new plow truck. As you know we’ve had to retire two plow trucks which took us down from five to three, four if you count the spare,” Village Administrator Greg Thompson told the village board at their meeting Monday, March 7.
“We went into the last storm — I apologize if the roads weren’t as good as they’ve been folks — we actually went into the last storm with one plow truck,” Thompson said. “Everything else was down. We went in with a 1998 Volvo. It was the oldest truck in the fleet and we went out dug all the parts out of the pile. Luckily they all worked and the truck never failed us the whole way through the storm.”
Thompson said when things will break “as luck would have it” they will break about two hours before snow starts falling. “And that’s just exactly what happened,” he said.
Thompson said currently the village has a brand new 2022 plow truck sitting in Watertown for repairs to the rear end that went out on it. That repair is under warranty but Thompson said he would not expect to see that vehicle back before June.
Other vehicles in the fleet are not exactly in road-ready shape either.
The village’s 1998 Volvo was just pressed back into service during the last storm, but is old by any standard.
The village also has two Mac plow trucks, a 2019 and a 2015. The 2015 should be the truck that gets retired once the new truck arrives, but because he had to retire two International dump trucks due to electrical problems in the last 8 months the village would be hanging on to the 2015.
“We’re out of synch in our rotation big time right now,” Thompson said.
“You need two trucks instead of one. The prices are right right now with the state contracts to get a second truck,” said Trustee Steve Warr.
Thompson said he could currently get a second new truck for $250,000 under a lease to own agreement like the one currently on order.
He said if he doesn’t order a second plow truck now, it will be a two-year wait on just the chassis and longer for the cab and other parts if the village waits.
“That’s a big bite,” he said. “That is something for (the board) to contemplate. Do we get everything back online and get everything where its supposed to be so we don’t run into situations.”
“We are having to run the grader up and down side streets. That’s not an easy task. We are lucky we have the operators we have that can do that.”
“I don’t think we contemplate it. I think we get the truck,” said Warr.
Thompson said the new truck the village currently has on order is expected to arrive in May from Rochester. If a second truck was ordered it could be in Potsdam sometime in July or August.
“I don’t see much choice. We are going to have to find a way,” said Trustee Alexandra Jacobs Wilke.
“I would move we get the second truck,” Warr said.
“Yeah, just order it,” said Village Mayor Ron Tischler.
