Swims favored over splash

Spokane needs an indoor public swimming pool and well-maintained neighborhood pools, not a fancy water park with slides and moving water, said a group of citizens who attended the second of two public meetings on the future of city pools this week.

The Spokane Parks and Recreation Department is considering upgrading the city’s aging pools.

Three out of five remaining outdoor pools last saw major work in 1959 and 1960. Two others were upgraded in the early 1980s.

Both of Shadle Park’s pools – one indoor and one outdoor – have been closed due to deterioration and to make room for expansion of Shadle Park High School.

Parks officials have suggested a modern water park at a cost of about $15 million to include a beachlike gradual entry, “lazy river,” splash features, wave pool and other features.

“I want you to begin to think big for the next 50 years,” said Patricia Soto, lead consultant for Counsilman-Hunsaker, a nationally renowned pool engineering firm hired to write a 50-year pool master plan for Spokane.

But the citizens who showed up at the East Central Community Center had more practical concerns.

They said closure of the Shadle indoor pool this spring leaves the city without a public year-round facility.

“Spokane is a sad swimming town,” said Sue Dills, a competitive swimmer. “There are so few pools for the amount of people who want to swim.”

She said children need to learn basic swimming and that paying for a splash pool is “like building a video arcade rather than a library.”

Louis Franchino, a leader in an effort to save Comstock Pool, said the public wants existing pools maintained and will be reluctant to approve newer features if neighborhood swimming is overlooked.

“They get a little hesitant if they lose what they already have,” he said.

Comstock residents were put on the defensive when an aquatics citizens advisory committee recommended in December 2005 that Comstock Pool be replaced along with construction of an indoor aquatics center adjacent to Albi Stadium and refurbishing of other pools. The committee also called for construction of spray features at neighborhood parks.

Soto said the consultant’s findings will be submitted by midyear. At least one more public meeting is planned.

One resident objected to the use of consultants.

“We don’t need an outside consultant coming in here and spending your tax money on this trendy thing,” said Brad White.

Soto said that other communities have learned that water parks raise enough money to offset high operating costs for lessons and competitive swimming.

But water parks typically charge admission fees, which would amount to a retreat from Spokane’s longstanding policy of free swimming for children.

Officials have suggested keeping swimming free at neighborhood pools. They also have suggested adding wading pools inside fenced enclosures of neighborhood pools to replace some of the 12 wading pools taken out in 2005, a move that was widely unpopular.

For years the city had six outdoor pools. Shadle outdoor pool closed two years ago.

Cannon Pool dates back nearly 80 years with renovations in 1960 and 1984. Hillyard Pool, which dates back just as far, had a new pool built inside the old one in 1960.

Comstock was renovated in 1959. The Shadle facility and Witter Pool were built in 1960.

Liberty Pool holds the distinction of being the city’s newest. It was built to replace a condemned facility as the result of a 1983 voter-approved bond issue, which included improvements to pool facilities citywide.

A bond issue in 1999 provided some money for pool improvements in 2000, including paint and sealant caulking.