Haverhill, MA Property Maintenance: Snow & Sidewalk Clearing (2026)

Haverhill City Code § 216-1 puts the clearing duty first on the tenant or occupant of an abutting building or lot, and only on the owner, agent or person having care and custody if there is no tenant. Snow must be removed within six hours after it stops falling or after it has collected on the walk, whether it fell there directly or drifted or slid off a nearby roof. Where no formal sidewalk exists, the responsible party must still clear a path at least four feet wide along the portion of the street used as a footway.

The six-hour clock does not run between 9:00 p.m. and 9:00 a.m., so overnight accumulation does not trigger a violation until 9 a.m. A companion rule at § 216-2 requires ice to be cleared or sanded within six hours of forming and flatly bans spreading salt on any sidewalk or footway. Roof snow gets its own deadline: § 216-5 gives owners 24 hours to clear snow and ice from a sloped roof near a street or sidewalk, or requires permanent barriers to stop it from falling onto the public way.

Dumping shoveled snow back into a street or way you do not have permission to use is separately banned under § 216-4. When a sidewalk stays encumbered past the deadline, § 216-3 directs the Chief of Police to notify the responsible party, and if the walk is not cleared within three hours of that notice, the Chief of Police must prosecute. Because Chapter 216 sets no chapter-specific dollar penalty, violations fall under the Code's general penalty clause, § 1-16A, which caps fines at $300 per offense and treats each day of noncompliance as a separate offense, with noncriminal disposition available as an alternative enforcement track under § 1-16B.