WNY Lawmaker Seeks Use Of Canadian Road Salt

Legislation introduced recently in the state Assembly would allow local governments to purchase road salt from Canada.

Assemblyman Patrick Chludzinski, R-Cheektowaga, has introduced A.5890 to amend state law to allow for the purchase of rock salt or sodium chloride that is mined or harvested north of the border after a shortage of rock salt this year has left many towns and villages across the state running short of rock salt with a month to go before spring.

Chludzinski said the New York State Buy American Salt Act, as currently structured, has helped cause the salt shortage by forcing most Western New York municipalities to contract with American Rock Salt, which is located in Livingston County. The bill was signed into law in December 2022 by Gov. Kathy Hochul. The company said in early February that it was struggling to meet the demand created by this year’s cold weather and persistent snowfall.

“We also have taken additional measures to increase supply, including opening our reserve stockpiles; the purchase of new underground equipment to mine additional salt; and construction of more access points to our underground conveyor and bin system to help transport more salt to our processing equipment,” the company said in a news release on Feb. 3. “With these efforts we have successfully increased daily production by over 25%, while maintaining a safe working environment.For further context, in 2024 American Rock Salt shipped 1.8 million tons of salt for the entirety of the winter season; this winter through January 2025 alone we have already shipped over 2.1 million tons of salt. In total, we have mined and shipped more salt so far this winter than all of last year.”

Chautauqua County and the city of Jamestown have said they will begin mixing salt with sand to make sure they have enough salt to finish the winter while the village of Lakewood received a shipment of salt recently that should last the village for the winter. But not all municipalities have been so lucky. Chludzinski said some communities are restricting use of salt to main roads and intersections with stop signs and traffic lights.

“The lack of contract options, therefore, has become a public safety issue,” he said. “Prior to the current law, municipalities in Western New York could purchase salt from an American owned company called Compass Minerals but can no longer because the mine they harvest from is in Ontario, Canada. The intent of the original legislation was to stop importing salt from faraway places such as Egypt, because they were selling salt so cheap to

undercut our own companies’ ability to secure contracts, and their labor practices were not to our standards. This was a laudable goal, and we want to protect the interests of American workers while ensuring our roads are safe and drivable. That is why the scope of this bill is limited only to include Canada which is our neighbor and closest ally.”