WILMINGTON — Winter storm planning for 2020-21 has been released by the Clinton County Engineer’s Office, providing plans made by the County, City and State Highway Departments, as well as the Sheriff’s Office, Emergency Management Agency (EMA), and various townships.
ODOT
The Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT) will be running 19 routes. Clinton County ODOT now treats U.S. Route 68 from Wilmington to Xenia, and State Route 72 through Jamestown in Greene County all the way to the 35 bypass.
ODOT will not pre-treat roads except for Interstate highways.
The salt used by ODOT is treated with calcium or brine at the spinner to start the process of deicing sooner. If the temperature is above 20 degrees, brine will be used.
ODOT is making a push statewide to reduce the amount of salt used.
ODOT’s first priority routes are the Interstate first and then the main arteries into the city.
For various winter weather updates and the road conditions on state routes for the entire state of Ohio, you can access the ODOT website — www.buckeyetraffic.org . The site is updated twice a day. They post whether they are out and how many trucks are working the storm, in addition to the Winter Storm Level. Each county in Ohio updates their information to this site.
City of Wilmington
The City is currently running six routes. It will operate on 12-hour shifts during winter storms.
The City does not plan to pre-treat with brine, unless there is a forecast of a major ice storm.
County Engineer’s Office
They will run nine routes this year, averaging 30 to 35 miles per route.
The engineer’s office will have salt available to sell to townships, schools and villages this year.
Emergency Management (EMA)
In the case of people losing power, EMA will set up emergency shelters with the help of Red Cross, if needed, and direct people to them.
Warming shelters are available all during the winter. The Clinton County GIS (Geographic Information System) Department currently has a map showing the location of these warming shelters. The map will be provided to the Sheriff’s Office to put on their website.
The warming shelters include all city and village municipal buildings (during working hours), and all fire departments. Most of these locations have backup generators. In addition, they have cooking facilities.
Currently, a Code Red Mass Communication system is used to send alerts to a certain geographical region or the whole county, if needed. Emergency Management may transition to a new alert system in 2021. It could be used for weather alerts, boil advisories, etc. Only “warnings” are issued.
Residents are encouraged to sign up to be included in the Code Red Mass Communication system. The phone needs to be registered to a Clinton County resident, but there is no charge. Residents may receive notifications through email, text, Twitter, calls, etc. The county website contains the information and link.
Officials emphasize to residents to include their address when signing up for Code Red to ensure they receive specific location-related alerts within the county.
