Now that the snow and cold are here in Iowa, the City of Jefferson has a few reminders for its citizens.

City Administrator Mike Palmer says last year, the downtown area business were not allowed to use salt on the new concrete sidewalks as an ice-melting agent, but now he says you can use whatever you want.

He explains why new concrete needs that one-year period without any salt mixtures being applied to it.

“A lot of it’s on how it cures.  If it doesn’t get hard enough that very top skim of it is highly susceptible for salt to eat through it and then it gets down to the rock or aggregate.  And it just keeps eating away and you get all of this pitted concrete and it just keeps getting worse and worse over time.”

Palmer points out that the other free services the City provides such as its clean up projects for the fall and spring as well as the tree chipping services are done for the winter and will begin again next spring.

However, one free service that continues all year round is that residents can take yard waste to its dump site at Daubendiek Park anytime and at no charge.