This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Cottonwood Heights is taking over its snowplowing.
On Tuesday night, the City Council approved a lease-to-own plan for a fleet of snowplows, beginning this winter.
For the past few years, the city has contracted with Terracare Associates for its road maintenance, which includes snow removal. The city is ending that contract this summer.
"We realized we could do the same things for the same cost," and the new plan allows the city to deal with any issues without a middleman, said city spokesman Dan Metcalf. He added that the move "gets back to our core principles, why we incorporated … local control over municipal services."
Metcalf noted that the decision was not born out of any negativity toward Terracare, which "really improved" its service to the city.
Two years ago, some streets in Cottonwood Heights weren't plowed days after the city was hit with a big storm; Terracare initially deployed only a handful of plows. Last December, when the city was hit hard and fast with a storm, Terracare put 18 snowplows on the roads right away.
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