By Tom Gilchrist
Staff Writer
GAGETOWN — Jack Laurie, chairman of the board overseeing the Tuscola County Road Commission, peppered Morton Salt Inc. with criticism on Thursday afternoon, saying Morton charged the village of Gagetown about $130 per ton for road salt for ice control.
“That’s outrageous,” Laurie told Road Board members.
“Talk about a rip-off,” Laurie added. “(Morton) convinced (Gagetown) that price was because they didn’t take that much and all that stuff.”
Prices of road salt increased by 46 percent from November of 2013 to November of 2014, according to Michigan Department of Transportation officials, who attributed the higher price to increased demand from last winter.
The average price per ton jumped from $44.99 in 2013 to $65.81 a year later, according to the state agency.
But the price for Gagetown, population 425, doubled from about $65 last winter to the $130 Morton Salt charged the village this year, said village President David Abbe.
“We couldn’t figure out why the price was so much higher but the supplier just said there’s a real shortage of salt because of the winter before this one,” Abbe said.
Denise Lauer, spokeswoman for Chicago-based Morton Salt, said last winter’s harsh weather “depleted supplies and created significant costs in production, sourcing, transportation and distribution, which is affecting prices this year.”
Lauer added that “Generally speaking, the price of road salt is dependent upon a variety of factors, including but not limited to the salt production costs, the time of the customer’s purchase, the supply and demand for salt, the costs to source salt from points that may be outside normal channels, and the freight cost to deliver it.”
Though the county Road Commission orders salt in much larger quantities than Gagetown, the Road Commission paid from $62 per ton to $67 per ton for road salt in recent months — depending on when it ordered it.
Last month, the state Attorney General’s office announced it found no evidence of price-fixing or other illegal conduct by salt suppliers after salt prices spiked from last winter, when Michigan was hit by record snowfalls and frigid temperatures.
“We used all 50 tons of our salt last winter, but this winter’s been real good to us so far,” Abbe said. “We’ve really saved a lot of money on winter maintenance this year. That takes some of the sting out of the salt price. We’ll have some of the salt left over, maybe, this year.”
Bob McCreedy, supervisor of Gagetown’s Department of Public Works, has been frugal about salt use to save money, according to Abbe. “Basically he’s just salting the intersections so people don’t slide out onto the main drag,” Abbe said, noting that icy side streets are farther down the priority list.
“If the side streets get real bad then he’ll put some on the side streets,” Abbe said.
During the last few weeks of winter in 2014, the village couldn’t find any road salt, Abbe said. “We tried to go find a couple truckloads, and called around, but nobody had any,” he said.
Given the price of salt these days, Laurie views Gagetown’s salt supply in a different light.
“We look after the steps and the sidewalk at our church (in Gagetown) and when we do that, on Saturday night or Sunday morning, my son always runs down to the (village) salt shed and gets a five-gallon bucket of salt to put on the sidewalk,” Laurie said.
“Now I’m really feeling guilty. We’re stealing a lot of money out of there.”