After several rounds of winter storms, many around New Hampshire are struggling to navigate uncleared snow banks and icy sidewalks. On social media, some people have raised concerns about the impact of uncleared pathways for students who walk to school or people with mobility challenges.
In New Hampshire, cities and towns are largely responsible for maintaining their own sidewalks. An 1898 decision from the New Hampshire Supreme Court found that cities and towns could not require private property owners to clean up nearby municipal sidewalks. More recently, in 2009, the court ordered the town of Tilton to keep its sidewalks clean during the winter so that those pathways remained accessible, as mandated by the Americans with Disabilities Act.
In recent years, it’s been a challenge for state and local governments to hire enough plow drivers or other public works employees to help with winter storm cleanup. But that doesn’t absolve cities and towns from their legal obligation to maintain accessible walkways, James Ziegra, senior staff attorney at the Disability Rights Center said.
“Staffing shortages are not an excuse to not provide accessible sidewalks for people,” Ziegra said. “Especially when getting around town is critical and people have mobility impairments and they're not able to drive or access public transportation or even to get to public transportation.”
If people are seeing blocked or difficult to access sidewalks, Ziegra recommends reaching out directly to the local public works department. If it’s still an issue, he said they might want to seek outside legal help.
In Dover, officials say staffing shortages are making it hard to keep up this winter. Community Services Director John Storer oversees a department that handles public water, sewers, roads, highways and snow removal. He said tighter budgets have made it hard to recruit and retain workers — not to mention, some staff, like so many others right now, are also getting sick. All of it affects how fast and when a snow plow comes around, he said.
Storer said Dover has roughly 80 miles of publicly maintained sidewalks, and they do not have enough equipment or staff to immediately plow every mile right after a storm. There’s a possibility they may not be able to get to the whole city by the end of the season.
“That is a stark reality of what we're dealing with with the level of staffing and funding and equipment that we have,” Storer said.
With those constraints in mind, Storer said the city has to be strategic about how they clear snow. They target areas with high traffic first, like commercial areas and public transportation routes.
“We try to have one key walking route through all the school zones, so a child can safely walk to and from school,” Storer said. “But it may mean that we're not able to get both sides of the street in a timely fashion.”
