Snow Escrow

All this "sturm und drang" about the massive snowfall blowing through the city budget, and it turns out everything was already paid for?

• A “snow escrow” salted away in anticipation of a brutal winter will allow Chicago to absorb $33.2 million in snow removal spending — $12.9 million over budget — without raising taxes, a top mayoral aide said Friday.
  
  Mayor Rahm Emanuel set aside $20.3 million for snow removal for all of 2014 assuming that would be enough to cover this winter and the start of next.
  
  Instead, he had already spent $33.2 million through Thursday after a storm this week that dropped another six inches on parts of Chicago.
  
  That includes: $19.3 million on salt, $7 million on labor, including countless hours of overtime; $5.3 million on equipment and $1.6 million on private trucks hired to pick up salt after a Morton Salt Co. barge got stuck in ice on the Mississippi River.
  
  That has fueled speculation about a supplemental appropriation to cover snow removal costs that would either be covered by borrowing or by a mid-year tax increase.
  
  On Friday, Budget Director Alex Holt put those dire scenarios to the rest.
  
  Holt said there’s a $12 million surplus in the motor fuel tax fund that covers snow removal and bridge repairs that will be “carried over into 2014 to offset” the extraordinary costs incurred during this brutal winter that just won’t quit.

Of course, this info was released on a Friday afternoon after 1630 hours - the place where all important news goes to die. We even missed it until just now. Funny how money always seems to appear when Rahm needs it for something that isn't on a deadline - like a balloon payment to the underfunded pensions. We certainly hope the people over at "We Are One" have been keeping track of all this over the past few years of Rahm's administration.