Sign of the times? Rohnert Park pools may close

A pool, park and school in every neighborhood has long been part of Rohnert Park's promise as a family friendly community.

The City Council is considering today whether to close two pools this summer as a cost-cutting move that also recognizes that the use of pools has tailed off dramatically.

"It's clear the council is wrestling with the fact that pools in Rohnert Park are part of our identity and a major part of the identity of the recreation program," said Dan Schwarz, the city's interim city manager.

The use of the city's five pools, however, has dropped from 41,525 users in 1997 to 20,088 in 2007. The cost of maintaining all five pools is $456,000 a year, creating a deficit of $357,500.

Also, the city would need to spend $486,000 in improvements to bring the pools up to the latest federal safety standards and to maintain them.

At the same time, the city this year is facing a $1.5 million shortfall caused by a drop in revenue, largely due to the recession. It is also facing a budget deficit of $7 million to $8 million next year.

"In this economic climate, it would be silly to fix all the pools; they are not up to code and functioning properly," said Councilwoman Pam Stafford. "We should fix some of them; we don't want to be the city with no pools."

The City Council is being asked to spend $120,000 to bring Honeybee, Benicia and Magnolia pools up to federal safety standards and open them in May.

Honeybee, the only pool open year-round, gets the most use, 90 people a day, which is still less than half of capacity, followed by Benicia, 70 people, and Magnolia, 53 people.

The city's other two pools, Alicia and Ladybug, would be decommissioned and eventually replaced by less expensive spray pools. Alicia is used by 30 people a day and Ladybug 28.

"I think one of the amenities of Rohnert Park is the parks and pools, and I want to do my best to keep them open," said Councilman Joe Callinan, who included keeping pools open in his campaign platform last fall.

Stafford said Rohnert Park never had a park, pool and school in every neighborhood anyway and the city doesn't need more than three pools now.

"That was an original idea, a long, long time ago," Stafford said. "Where I lived, we were told there would be a school, but it was never built. We have a park, and the parks are great, but there aren't pools in every neighborhood."

The meeting is at 6:30 p.m. today in the City Hall council chambers.

You can reach Staff Writer Bob Norberg at 521-5206 or bob.norberg@pressdemocrat.com