The Sweet Home City Council adopted a resolution 5-2 agreeing to fund half of the cost of a new pool should voters approve a $21.6 million bond measure for School District 55 in May.
The City Council had previously considered the proposal in December but tabled the issue until last week to gather further information.
Somewhere between 60 and 70 supporters gathered at the Fire Hall to speak in support of the resolution.
The School Board had wanted the City Council’s agreement to pay half the cost of the pool’s operation and maintenance before it would include a new $2.8 million pool facility in the bond proposal, which will also include the reconstruction of large portions of Sweet Home High School.
Total operation costs, based on an architect’s estimates, will be approximately $300,000 per year after pool revenues are included. The revenues would offset an additional $100,000 to $150,000 in operations and maintenance costs.
Aquatic Director James Mellein told the Council that the pool had 3,035 persons registered in programs in 2000, although some persons may be counted twice through different swim lesson sessions, pool rentals and other activities. The total number of uses at the pool was 40,395 in 2000. Of those, 22,078 visits were made by community programs, 13,421 by the School District and 4,896 by the Sweet Home Swim Club.
The district has nine programs using the pool, while the community at large has 16, Mellein said.
Councilman Dick Hill, joined by Councilman Robert G. Danielson, wanted to know how many users live inside and outside the city limits, but that information was unavailable. He was concerned that if the city is paying operation costs, it would be using city residents’ tax dollars to pay for residents outside the city to use the pool. Previously, he was also concerned about counting users multiple times and thought that overall, the proposal benefited a small percentage of the population.
A new pool is needed, Hill said, but he also was concerned about spending money on a new pool while the city had so many other needs, such as drainage improvements and repairing sewer lines. He proposed developing an alternative cost-sharing proposal to reflect actual use by Sweet Home taxpayers.
Danielson said he didn’t think that half was the right share for the City of Sweet Home.
“I bet you the figures are more like 70-30 or 75-25,” Danielson said. “But not 50-50.”
If the School district doubles the salaries of employees in the pool, “what do we have to say about it?” Danielson said. “This resolution, to me, is a blank check to the School District.”
He asked how, when the City of Sweet Home is hurting for money, it can tell residents being flooded as a result of inadequate drainage that the city does not have the money to help them but pays $150,000 per year for the pool.
“I’d like to have a new pool,” Hill said. “You go into the that filter room. I’ve never seen so much rust in one place.”
There are other issues to consider, he said.
“I think that we have really good information,” pool advocate Donna Short said. “I think it could be a strong partnership between the District, City and greater Sweet Home community.”
“The numbers that Mr. Mellein presented give us food for thought,” pool proponent Rob Slauson said. He likened multiple uses to emergency services, where a police officer or paramedic had to respond multiple times, three times for example, to the same address and asked whether that would be counted as three separate responses or one.
A number of area residents, mostly from outside the city limits, supported the resolution.
They pointed to lives being saved because children learn to swim, the therapeutic value to senior citizens and the programs supported by the pool.
Councilman Jim Gourley said that if the City Council stopped all other programs, it might be able to build a new water plant in a year, but “I don’t think we want to stop every program.”
As the City of Sweet Home addresses infrastructure problems, it must continue forward and fund its other programs as well, Gourley said.
“There are other needs the city has as everyone is well aware,” City Manager Craig Martin said. “It really comes down, in my opinion, to balancing these needs. You could obligate this amount of dollars into the pool” without affecting other programs.
A new water plant, which would bring the City of Sweet Home to current U.S. Environmental Protection Agency standards, would cost some $5 million, Martin said. “Do you want to try to serve that need or try to serve multiple needs?”
Councilman Bob McIntire told the Council that water and sewer have designated funds to take care of those systems and that is why those rates were increased in July.
Wherever the money comes from to pay for the pool, it all really comes from the same pocket, McIntire said, and the council should support a new pool.
Voting yes on the resolution were McIntire, Tim McQueary, Jim Bean, Gourley and Mayor Craig Fentiman. Voting against the resolution were Hill and Danielson.