Possibilities range from demolition to a $7 million aquatic center
By John Koski
SLN Staff
At its meeting Monday night, the Elkhorn City Council listened to a summary of a report on Sunset pool prepared by Stantec Consulting of St. Paul, Minn. Presenting the report was Jim Maland, head of Stantec’s aquatics group.
The report was prepared to help the council determine the best course of action for the aging facility
“Sunset pool is beyond its functional life and its physical life is very thin,” Maland said. “A 45-year-old pool is an old pool. The typical life expectancy for a pool is 30 to 40 years.
“(Sunset pool) is really a swimming pool,” he added. “Most pools today are built with water slides, interactive water features and zero-depth entries.”
He went on to note that modern pools appeal to a much wider age group than a pool like Sunset pool because they enable people to not only swim but to engage in other recreational activities. Perhaps, in the future, they can construct an outparcel next to the pool area so that the community can gain monetary benefits.
“Right now, you’re operating at about a 50 percent cost recovery (of operating expenses),” Maland said. “A modern pool achieves about 80 percent cost recovery.”
He went on to explain a number of available options.
“You can continue to keep the pool open and put up to $15,000 a year into (maintaining) it. It could be greater if something catastrophic happens, but I can’t tell you how long it will run.
“You could demolish the facility at a cost of $50, 000 to $85,000, depending on whether any lead-based paint or asbestos were discovered.”
Maland noted that demolishing the pool and adjacent structures would open the site for other options.
“One of those options,” he said could be a modern flat pad, which is a zero-depth body of water with interactive water features.
“The beauty of a flat pad is it does not require a lifeguard, and they are less expensive than a pool. The downside of a pad is that the demographic that uses them is very young people with families, and it doesn’t provide a swimming experience.
“A small pad of about 1,500 square feet could easily cost $300,000 to $700,000 and would accommodate about 80 people. A medium-size pad could cost $700,000 to $1.5 million. The reason the prices vary is because there are a lot of amenities you can put in.”
A third option Maland discussed was a shallow water pool.
“Again, the demographic for this is primarily young people and their families. The cost would range between $1.5 and $2.5 million. It would have shallow water with a lot of interactive water features, along with shaded areas.
“The biggest thing you could do would be to build a modern-day aquatic facility,” Maland said, “where people could swim and do laps. It would also have zero-depth and shallow-water areas as well as interactive water features and an expansive area of grass. It would be more of a destination-type facility.”
The cost, he said would be between $3.5 million to $7 million.
“A final option would be to investigate reopening Elkhorn Lake,” he said, “but my understanding is that the water there is relatively cold.”
Maland strongly suggested that the council do a community survey to determine which option the public would be interested in.
He noted that most of the options would probably require a public referendum to generate the needed funds.
“If you don’t have the people on board,” he said, “then you’re just wasting your time trying to get a referendum passed.
“What a statistically valid survey does is help you know what the community is thinking about,” he said “You might need to do a little education first to show what options are available.
“The beauty of this is that it will give you an idea of what the people who will be voting on a referendum are thinking about,” Maland noted. “It can save you a lot of time, especially if there is no interest in a particular option.
“If you don’t know what everyone in a town is thinking,” Maland said, “then you’re playing with destiny. I’ve been to many communities where they have a pool committee that all it sees are roses wherever they go. And then you go through this whole process and have a referendum and it just gets killed.
“To me, that’s waste of time and money. That’s why it’s important to know what the public is thinking.”
Mayor Howie Reynolds thanked Maland for his presentation, noting that it was the type of tool the council needed as it considers its options for Sunset pool.
