With the first real wide-spread snow upon Central New York, snowplow drivers are working overtime to get streets salted and cleared. This year, Syracuse has received around three inches of snow, compared to more than 70 inches last year at the same time. As our Katie Gibas reports, the mild weather has added up to big savings for the Syracuse Department of Public Works.

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SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- With just about three inches of snow this season, it's been like a mini vacation for snowplow drivers in the City of Syracuse.

"We like it this way. We haven't had it like this in a couple of years, so it's a good break," said Martin Davis, the Syracuse DPW Deputy Commissioner.

Last year at this time, Syracuse already had nearly 74 inches of snow, compared to this year's single digit accumulation. DPW crews have used only 600 tons of salt. That's about 9,000 tons less than last year.

"We have significant savings in salt, significant savings in overtime obviously and probably 9,600 gallons of fuel saved," said Davis.

And all that adds up to big dollar signs.

"Operationally, it's about half a million dollars in savings for this year's time period compared last year's time period. Overall, we'll be able to tell that at the end of this snow season, so we would average it all out. We may have a very bad rest of the year and it might average it out. If we have a gentle winter like we're having so far, we might save a lot," said Davis.

The mild winter hasn't just saved cash, it's also allowed DPW workers to catch up on their other duties, including pothole repair and debris and leaf pickup, something they were criticized for not doing enough of last year because the snow came so heavily so early in the season.

"Last year, we didn't get through the whole city one time with leaf pickup. This year, we've gone through two and a half times with the long fall we've had. So yes, we really appreciate that. The best part of it is that the sewer department is able to clean out the catch basins, so all the catch basins are leaf free, so everything drains," said Davis.

Davis says even though they're not expecting much snow for the rest of the week, they're prepared with plenty of salt if comes down to it.

Syracuse DPW had 16 crews working their day shift Wednesday and 12 on the overnight. So far, they've used over 200 tons of salt on Syracuse's streets just in the last 24 hours.