The city of North Battleford plans to send out a request for proposals to contractors for snow clearing this upcoming winter.
Public works director Stewart Schafer informed council about those plans at Monday's meeting.
The reason behind the move is to ensure sidewalks are cleaned across the city. Approximately 60 per cent of city sidewalks were never cleaned last year, according to estimates from public works and the bylaw department.
In speaking to reporters Schafer elaborated further on the problems the city faced last winter.
"Last year we had a lot of snow and a lot of people forgetting to use the snow shovel, or how to use a snow shovel," said Schafer.
"We're going to go out there and I'm not going to say force them, but we had a number of complaints that people couldn't use the wide sidewalk because there was two feet of snow."
Schafer also said the public works foreman had noted that before performing work on some curb stops on sidewalks, City crews had to remove 18 inches of hard packed snow on some of them.
In the past, the City hired contractors for the downtown area only. According to Schafer's memo, that created the false impression that sidewalks outside of downtown do not have to be cleaned of ice and snow.
Administration plans to send the RFP to local contractors wishing to provide sidewalk cleaning services for the 2013-14 season. If downtown property owners do not clear their sidewalks within 24 hours and if other property owners do not clear their sidewalks within 48 hours, the hired contractor will clear them and the cost will be passed on to the property owner.
The program will be revenue-neutral to the City, with the contractors invoicing for cleaning sidewalks adjacent to properties passed on to property owners along with a 15 per cent administration fee.
Those owners who do not pay the snow removal invoices will have the charges placed on their property taxes.
The public works department is hoping the message will get out to people to maintain their sidewalks this winter so they won't face these extra bills.
"Those people who do not wish to maintain their sidewalks in front of their property, we will maintain it for them," said Schafer.
