To the editor:

I saw reports about Tuesday’s Steubenville City Council meeting regarding citizens complaining of snow removal, or lack thereof, from sidewalks in the downtown and the city manager’s comments that snow removal from sidewalks is the responsibility of the property owner.

That is true, but the businesses still open downtown did shovel the snow. The problem is the number of vacant buildings where there is no one to shovel. Secondly, where do you put the snow that is shoveled? There is only so much that can be stacked against a building and shoveling it back into the street is not permitted. Shoveling to the curb only increases the snow already piled along the street due to the plowing, which prevents passengers from being able to exit the cars in which they are riding.

This past snowstorm was predicted for a week. There should have been a directive from the city that on-street parking was prohibited to permit adequate snow plowing, especially in the neighborhoods. As for the downtown, because of the number of vacant buildings, the city should have used a tractor with a plow to clear the sidewalks. As of this writing, the city still has not cleared the intersections in the downtown business area for pedestrians. I have tried crossing them twice and the danger of falling is greater than walking in the street. And thus, the reason why people are walking in the streets. The people of Steubenville deserve better.

I know it takes extra time, but in the past when there was an extremely heavy snowfall, the city would use front-end loaders and put the downtown snow into dump trucks and then pile the snow in the outfield of Pleasant Heights field. This is because the EPA prohibits the snow from being dumped in the river. It certainly solves the problem, but this involves some thinking outside the box.

John Mascio

Steubenville