Charles City Parks & Rec Board looks at more pool options

By Bob Steenson, bsteenson@charlescitypress.com

Members of the Charles City Parks and Recreation Board are narrowing the options and getting ready to make recommendations on a repaired and refurbished outdoor municipal swimming pool project.

The latest suggestions, presented at the board’s monthly meeting Wednesday evening by JEO Consulting Group of Ankeny, were revised from a larger group of options presented at the meeting last month, and included more information on potential costs and funding sources for a project.

The total to fix the things that are wrong with the 32-year-old pool is about $1 million. That includes pool floor joint repair, tile replacement, gutter crack repairs, surge tank repair, adding a groundwater sump pump, adding a pump pit, adjusting the recirculation pump, replacing the filter and chemical systems, replacing deck equipment and repairing the fence.

The cost to build a new pool of the same size as the existing pool would be about $4.2 million, said Andrew Pennekamp, senior aquatics project manager and lead design engineer in JEO’s Aquatics Department.

But members of the Parks & Rec Board have said their goal is not simply to fix the existing pool and leave it with the same features it has. In order to generate excitement and boost declining attendance rates they want to add features, for swimmers of all ages.

The board had gone through a lengthy list of potential features offered by JEO at the April meeting, quickly deciding the total list was both too expensive and probably too crowded for the pool.

Based on the April meeting input, JEO came back this week with a shorter list and more precise cost estimates. The total price for the features discussed this week was $2 million, bringing the total project cost including pool repair, new features and installation, and design and administration costs, to $3.22 million.

One possible funding source for much of that cost could be a city general obligation bond for $3 million, paid back through property taxes, that would require 60% voter approval.

Pennekamp said all the estimates were conservative, so hopefully the costs would be less. There is also a 30% contingency factor built into the repair price and a 20% contingency built into the new features price, to cover unforeseen costs or increasing prices.

This latest list will be subject to revisions when the Parks and Rec Board sits down to talk about the options in more detail at its June meeting.

If the board decides to recommend the city go ahead with the project and asks the City Council to authorize a bond referendum, it will probably need to make a presentation to the City Council by the end of June, with a council decision on a referendum by the end of July to get it on the November ballot.

Because of a change in the law approved by the Iowa Legislature this session, all bond referendums must be on a regular November ballot. They no longer have the option of being held at a special election in March or September as before.

The list of features detailed this week by Pennekamp and by Cameron Raszler, water and wastewater project engineer at JEO, including feature cost and installation, is:

• Climbing wall – mounted at the side of the pool in about the 4-foot depth area, with room for two patrons to use it at a time – $65,150.
• Ninja Cross Mini Obstacle Course – mounted on two new concrete pillars, the steel span would include features such as rings, hoops and monkey bars to swing through or crawl through, both above the water and in the water – $174,810.
• Floatables – customizable animal or other object shapes anchored to the bottom of the pool that swimmers can climb on and bounce up and down. Cost for two including installing anchor points in the pool floor – $49,488.
• Zero-depth features – features for smaller children in shallow water, such as dump bucket, fountain and kiddie slide – $369,719. The high cost for this feature is because of needed piping to the feature, under existing pool concrete.
• Shallow depth play structure – kiddie slide and several interactive sprays and water features, utilizing piping from existing mushroom feature – $144,259.
• Pool bench with shade – submerged concrete bench with shades over the top – $110,875.
• Splash pad – ground level concrete splash pad with several interactive sprays, including new pump, electrical equipment, chemical equipment, etc. – $769,730. (See related separate story.)

The new features would require three additional lifeguards to add to the six currently usually on duty when the pool is open. The climbing wall and ninja obstacle course would each require a guard dedicated to monitoring those features.

Pennekamp provided a cost breakdown, showing how increasing the average daily attendance in the pool and raising the admittance price to more closely match other area aquatic centers could cover the cost of the additional lifeguards.

More in-depth discussion and possibly some decision-making on the project is planned for the June meeting of the Parks & Rec Board.