Last Year's Snowpocalypse Costs Nearly $2M in payouts

Berkeley PlaceThis time last year we were all staring out our windows at a mountain of snow in the street and wondering where the fuck the snow plows were. When last December's snowmaggedon hit, which dropped more than two feet of white stuff in parts of the city, it took three full days to get the streets of Park Slope cleaned. Upon learning that the delays were caused by the sanitation department's tizzy fit over budget cuts, everyone blamed Mayor Bloomberg and his administration for the whole damn thing. 

I don't know about you guys, but aside from having to scale a single mountain, suitcase in hand, at the foot of my street after returning home from Christmas in Massachusetts, I wasn't too affected by the storm (side note: scaling that mountain was like defeating the Aggro Crag on Guts. It was pretty epic.) Others however, were more inconvenienced, and have spent the last 365 days suing the city's ass over it.

According to the city's Comptroller's office, 1,196 claims have been filed in association with the blizzard and its aftermath. These include claims from people injured while traversing icy roads and sidewalks, as well as damage caused to personal property due to the city's (sloppy?) snow removal efforts. So far, $1,855,152.53 has been paid out to 620 of the aforementioned claims. Holy shit, that's a lot of money.

So how will the city avoid a similar game of "Watch us drop the ball" this winter?

Via CBS NY:

In April, the City Council passed legislation that members said would prevent a repeat of the mistakes that took place during the December 2010 storm. The package of bills requires city officials to establish rules determining when they activate emergency operations and when they ask for help from the state and other jurisdictions.

Under the new measures, the city also must notify the public of disruptions to public services, make a plan for how to handle high 311 information hotline call volume in emergencies and publish an annual evaluation of the city’s snow response.

Speaking of snow, did anyone else see a white Christmas this year? It snowed around 10AM for exactly one hour in my small hometown of Carver, Massachusetts on Christmas day. It was wicked awesome and whatnot. Go Sox.