Anoka County engineer Doug Fischer began preparing for the biggest Christmas storm in 30 years last summer.

"We're budgeted for 22,000 tons of [road] salt a year, and it would be very stressful to have only a few tons left at the end of December," Fischer said Wednesday. "So I play the commodities game and buy salt in July, if the price is low.

"It may be 90 degrees out, but we're still thinking about the day we get a foot or two of snow."

Long before forecasters predicted the storm that swept into Minnesota on Wednesday, metro-area county engineers began checking their lists of available crew members, assigning snow-removal routes and getting approval for overtime pay in preparation for a Christmas storm likely to delay anyone whose engine isn't named Rudolph.

"We have a plan," Fischer said, ready to tackle the pending storm with the focus of the linebacker he once was at Iowa State. "But our plan is a little different."

Hennepin County will send out most of its 71 plow trucks en masse during the day and then deploy as few as eight overnight, said county highway-maintenance supervisor Mike Legg. Ramsey County is also expected to send nearly all of its 35 plows at once and then take breaks, said Ken Raider, Ramsey County engineer.

But Anoka County, with 23 plows on the road at a time, appears to have set the metro-area gold standard when it comes to snow removal. Thirteen years ago, Anoka County was recognized by the National Association of Counties for an innovative two-shift snow-removal system that keeps the bulk of the county's plows on the road 24 hours a day.

Twelve-hour shifts that are union-approved and come with double-time pay during Christmas begin at 2 a.m. or 2 p.m. Mechanics have been put on call to drive plows if necessary. There are crews assigned to fixing and replacing signs that are wiped out by cars sliding through intersections.

It comes with the white turf

"It throws a wrinkle into everybody's plans, if not a big wrench," Fischer said. "Everybody is reordering their lives. But our guys take this job seriously. It comes with the turf."

Christmas Day snow removal will cost Anoka County an expected $26,000 in holiday and overtime pay, Fischer said. Hennepin County will pay $30,000 more than it would on a nonholiday, according to Legg. And the city of St. Paul could pay as much as $100,000 more to remove snow on Christmas Day and the weekend days that follow, said Kevin Nelson, the city's street maintenance engineer.

Minneapolis, which will see its 2009 budget of $8.2 million for snow removal reduced to $7 million next year, budgets for 18,000 tons of salt, slightly less than Hennepin County. But Mike Kennedy, director of transportation and maintenance and repair for the city's Department of Public Works, said it's difficult to compare costs of plowing on Christmas Day with any other day. Overtime and holiday pay are givens, but the equipment and salt are already there, he said. Costs could really mount with the snow emergency shifts that follow the storm, he said.

"What is the cost to society if we don't do it?" Fischer said of counties and cities that pay overtime for snow removal.

Hennepin County's road crew is second in size only to the Department of Transportation's in Minnesota. The county may not appear larger than many others in the metro area, but it is the one with no gravel county roads -- meaning every one must be plowed, Legg said.

County roads in and immediately outside of Minneapolis and St. Paul often see more use than usual in dense storms because motorists choose to avoid the interstates, attracting added attention of road crews, Legg and Raider said.

While travelers may cringe with every snow projection this week, road crews see a silver lining through all the white.

"There's a pretty good buzz," Legg said of Wednesday's conversation among Hennepin County road workers who were anticipating "a little jing in their pockets."

And for counties such as Hennepin, which budgets for 22,000 tons of salt per year, or Ramsey, which budgets for 10,000 tons, a big storm can be less costly to salt than several small storms. The temperature is projected to be in the 20s, which makes the salt much more effective than in subzero conditions, Anoka's Fischer said.

"We have to salt each time it snows," Fischer said. "It's a lot cheaper to salt every so often for larger storms than it is to 40 times for 40 one-inch storms."

Paul Levy • 612-673-4419