Sean C. Morgan
Sweet Home City Council members toured Sweet Home High School’s pool facility on Thursday to get an idea what needs are driving pool users to ask for a new pool to be included on a proposed School District 55 bond planned for the March ballot.
The school board has agreed to place the pool in the bond under the condition that the City of Sweet Home share the operational and maintenance costs for the new facility.
The proposed bond would upgrade and repair numerous district facilities, including the demolition and reconstruction of portions of the high school, reconstruction of the track facility and additions to Hawthorne Elementary.
Pool users and the school district have identified a number of maintenance and capacity issues with the pool.
Aquatic Director James Mellein showed councilmen around the facility.
Mellein pointed to numerous cracks throughout the pool liner. The school district patches larger cracks every year with a fiberglass and silicone resin. The pool liner is the original 1948 pool liner.
In lane three, the liner has lifted away from the striping, leaving a sharp edge sticking up.
A large hole in the smaller pool, used for swim lessons was patched this year and last. The smaller pool was added inside the original pool. When it’s open, water fills the original liner and lifts the smaller pool’s liner.
The water also leaks into the ground.
The pipes in the pools have air in them from leaks, and air can be seen bubbling up at the corners of the pools at different times.
The pool roof has been repaired numerous times, but it still has a few leaks, and tiles are damaged and falling away.
The entire facility has a problem with humidity that newer facilities do not, Mellein said. During the winter, it causes the walls to sweat, streaking and staining the paint on the walls, and lockers, the newest in the entire high school, are rusting through on the bottom.
The deck space is “extremely limited,” Mellein said, and there is little seating for spectators. The facility has a capacity of 125 for swim programs. The lanes themselves are too narrow to hold regulation swim meets, such as district and state meets.
Pool staff have had to turn parents away from swim lesson programs because the pool was at capacity, Mellein said.
He points to an increasing usage at the pool. From an estimated 29,884 visits in 1996, usage increased to 39,892 in 1999. This year, with the most accurate figures to be gathered by pool staff, the pool has had 26,787 visits. This includes all school and community programs. Last year, the school district accounted for 22,762 visits, and community programs, such as Sweet Home Swim Club, accounted for 17,130 visits.
“Because the community uses the pool so much, we just feel the city should chip in and pay for at least part of the operation year in, year out,” Mellein said. “Lots of people don’t realize how much the community uses the pool.”
To repair and remodel the facility would cost an estimated $1.8 million Mellein said, but it would still have a limited capacity and be undersized for regulation meets. A new facility would cost an estimated $2.8 million.
A new, larger facility would benefit not only the community, but would also allow the school district to expand its water safety program for first through third graders to include fourth and fifth grades.
The operational costs are estimated at around $400,000 for the new facility. Currently, the pool is recouping approximately 15 percent of its operational costs through fees.
A newer, more efficient pool, City Manager Craig Martin, who also is vice president of the Sweet Home Swim Club, said the facility could return up to 50 or 60 percent of the cost.
The pool will cost more to operate than it does now, Martin said, but in the end, with a better return, the final cost may be same or conceivably less than it is now.