Nonessential city, town personnel sent home due to storm

A West Lebanon yard fills up with snow during today's storm. (Rochester Voice photo)

With blizzard conditions coming on fast, near-whiteout conditions are being reported and police are urging people that if they don't need to be on the roads they should hunker down and wait for the storm to pass.

"People should stay off the road if they can," Milton Police Chief Richard Krauss said today. "The less motoring traffic the easier it is to keep people safe."

Krauss said that in some wind gusts it's tough to see more than a car length in front of you.

"The snow is coming down pretty hard," he added.

In Rochester, City Manager Daniel Fitzpatrick said City Hall would be closing down at 11 a.m., while Lebanon offices stayed shuttered in anticipation of the storm's severity.

Rochester stopped short of going into its Emergency Management Response protocol, but Deputy Chief Tim Wilder said additional staff and apparatus have been prepped in advance of the storm.

Meanwhile, Milton Town Hall was expected to close at noon, said Selectmen Chair Andy Rawson, who added the roads out there "are brutal" and people should just stay home if they can.

"The roads are snow covered and slick," Rawson said.