Not Worth His Salt

Our crack Massillon Review research staff has been working feverishly all week. They have conclusively determined that it snows in North East Ohio in February.

We realize this bit of information will come as a shock to Massillon's Mayor for Life, Frank Cicchinelli, and his Street Superintendent, Mike Stevens.

This past week, our city endured the worst winter storm of the season.

This past Wednesday, The Independent reported that the City of Massillon Street Department was about out of road salt. They had enough salt left for Wednesday morning. That was it.

They were hopeful that they could to get more.

This situation was so unusual that 19 Action News from Cleveland braved the elements to come to Massillon and report on the situation.

The televised response from Street Department Superintendent Mike Stevens was less than inspiring;

"Th, Th, Th, There was no panic."

Whew!

Stevens, who has famously racked up gross amounts of overtime when the winter weather has buried our city in ice and snow, yet doesn't actually drive a truck, or plow snow, should have had plenty of time to properly prepare for inclement conditions.

How did neighboring Perry Township handle the storm? Did they have salt issues?

Nope.

"In Perry Township, Road Superintendent John Masalko's crew wasn't worried about its salt supply" (The Independent, February 2, 2011).

Perry Township was prepared.

Maybe Mike Stevens was relying on the fact that earlier in the morning, Puxatony Phil woke up and didn't see his shadow, meaning spring would come early to Tiger Town.

And as a result, Massillon would not need as much salt.

Our guess is that Stevens did not even do this much research in analyzing the city's need for a proper amount of road salt.

In case he doesn't know. It snows in February.

Every year.