Officials at Vashon’s park district say the Vashon Pool is projected to be $9,000 over budget ahead of the start of multiple projects that will bring it up to current accessibilty and safety codes.
According to Vashon Park District (VPD) Executive Director Elaine Ott, the pool’s 2016 operating budget was set at $59,700, but financials from the beginning of the pool’s season — Memorial Day through July — show a $6,000 overage. The August financials have not been closed and calculated yet, according to Ott, but another $3,000 overage is expected there. The pool’s season ended on Labor Day, Sept. 5.
Ott says a variety of situations attributed to the pool going over budget; among them was a cool summer that caused revenue to be $3,000 less than predicted. The low revenue was exacerbated by an influx of new lifeguards and pool staff that needed to be trained and a new online registration and membership purchasing system that required training.
“Wages for staff were up $3,000 because we had a lot of young, work inexperienced new employees,” she said last week. “We didn’t anticipate that. We couldn’t. It was necessary to spend a bit more time training, and we pay for training.”
Rounding out the trifecta of budget overage factors, Ott said Aquatics Director Scott Bonney had to replace some equipment, including the solar heating system and lifeguard supplies — adding up to another $3,000.
Meanwhile, now that the pool’s season has ended, work on projects to upgrade the pool that were outlined in a late-May engineering evaluation will begin. Tacoma-based ORB Architects, a firm specializing in aquatic facilities, completed a thorough analysis of the more than 40-year-old pool and determined that there were multiple repairs needed. Minor projects including increased accessibility, including locker and changing room upgrades, installing an accessible drinking fountain and installing a self-operable wheelchair lift in the pool, have either been fixed or will be fixed in the off-season.
Bonney said that the pool had been equipped with a lift that could be operated by pool staff, but not one that could be operated by wheelchair-bound individuals, which was required. The correct type of lift was found in storage and installed at the beginning of the swim season.
“We thought that (having the staff-operated lift) would be safer for us, but the law requires a self-operated lift,” Bonney said. “We installed that the first week the pool was open, and it works great.”
Major projects identified in the report include a $79,000 repair to the pool’s drain to bring it into compliance with federal law and repairs to the pool’s boiler.
Discussion about how to fund the drain repair has been ongoing since the discovery of the non-compliant drain in May, but Ott said last week that she has received verbal confirmation from the district’s insurance company that the expense can be covered.
“I made a request for a claim under the ‘errors and omissions’ part of our policy,” she said. “The sense was that (the compliance work) had been done. The law was passed just before the pool came to us.”
The pool’s drain is not in compliance with the 2008 Virginia Graeme Baker Pool & Spa Safety Act, a federal law that calls for safeguards to ensure the suction from pool drains is not strong enough to pose a trapping and drowning risk. Full compliance requires that drains be re-routed and special drain covers be installed. The pool was owned by King County during the time of the law’s passage, and ORB’s report indicates that drain covers were replaced, but the pipes were never fully re-routed to meet requirements.
Ott says that the park district was unaware that the pool’s drain was out of compliance when the pool ownership was transferred. The pool has passed every Department of Health inspection, and Bonney said that the issue came to light during last year’s inspection when the inspector asked for a copy of the final compliance report.
“I said, ‘We don’t have it. (The pool) was county-owned at the time and should’ve been done.’ The report is not there (at the county),” Bonney said.
The district has been granted a temporary, 18-month permit for the pool to continue operating as-is. Because the pool will need to be drained for the repairs and pool walls can collapse if work is done in the wet season, and because the work needs to be put out to an open bidding process, Ott said the work will have to wait until next September.
The current drain does not pose a threat to safety, according to the ORB report and Bonney.
Meanwhile, Bonney said the pool’s boiler, while compliant with all laws and codes, is old and inefficient. VPD has applied for a grant from King County to replace it and is hoping to receive the grant and have a new boiler ready for next season.
