With cars and pedestrians still navigating around mountains of snow at the Schuylkill County courthouse, commissioners on Wednesday approved a proclamation declaring Jan. 23 as a disaster emergency.

The action, said John M. Matz of the county Emergency Management Agency, will perhaps help municipalities recoup at least some of the money they spent dealing with the feet of snow that Winter Storm Jonas dumped on the county from Jan. 22 through Jan. 23.But there's a lot of paperwork to do before the county submits the information to the state Emergency Management Agency."Over the weekend, I had received a number of inquiries from municipal elected officials concerned about the high cost of dealing with the snowstorm. They had asked if there was any funding available. The only funding possibility would be a Presidential Disaster Declaration for Public Assistance," Matz said.The county's tasks include verifying through the National Weather Service that the county had a record or near-record snowfall over a one-, two- or three-day period.Initial totals released by the National Weather Service on Jan. 24 were 27 inches in Port Carbon, reported by the public; 24 inches in Pottsville, gathered from social media; 20 inches in Tamaqua, again gathered by social media, and 17 inches in Mahanoy City, reported by a co-op observer.National Weather Service meteorologist Craig Evanego said snowfall in Schuylkill County from Winter Storm Jonas ranged from 17-27 inches.He said Mahanoy City recorded 22 inches in February 2003."Mahanoy City received 17 inches from the recent storm, so it was not a new record. I would imagine that the amounts elsewhere in the county (especially at the higher end of the 17-27 inches range) were close to records though," Evanego said.The second hurdle the county must clear to qualify is to show that expenses for labor, equipment, materials and emergency contracts reach an aggregate amount of approximately $500,000, Matz said."We are awaiting the NWS determination, and are also using this time to collect information from our municipalities. We have requested they respond by (close of business) on Friday," he said.His office will then compile the data, and contact any municipalities that did not respond.The information will be sent to PEMA, which will add it to the compilation of all of the counties and state agencies."The state must show there is approximately $17.9 million in eligible expenses across the commonwealth for consideration," Matz said."If a Presidential Disaster Declaration is granted, it will be for those counties that met both benchmarks, snowfall and dollar amount. It is possible that Schuylkill will not be included, though our numbers will be used in the overall calculations," he said. "If Schuylkill is included, all municipalities will be eligible to request reimbursement, regardless of doing a declaration at the municipal level."Matz said the process is "usually not speedy; it may be many weeks before a determination is made."Our hope is that all of our 67 municipalities submit their cost in a timely manner and that we receive a favorable ruling on the snowfall from the NWS," he said.