At the Levy Forum coming up this Tuesday, aquatics supporters will present three modest proposals to the levy committee.  Unfortunately, the committee’s planning documents strongly suggest that all aquatics funding will be left out of the levy.  Renovation of Greenlake pool is the only aquatics project currently under consideration, but this project falls into the "Facilities" category, a category that is likely to be postponed to a future (theoretical) levy. 

Can you help convince the committee to include aquatics funding?  Yes, you can!  Join us in presenting our modest proposals on Tuesday.  If you can’t make it, send your own letter to the levy committee (parksandgreenspaceslevy@seattle.gov — further details here).

Pools serve all ages and abilities.  The three items we recommend provide tremendous bang-for-the-buck.   All contribute to the health of our citizens, the health of our communities and the health of the natural environment through energy efficiency. 

Our three proposals are summarized below; see here for full details.  Thank you for all your help!

Priority 1:  Fund a Long-Term Aquatics Development Plan. Cost Estimate:  $375,000

This 20-year, city-wide plan would consider emerging needs, maintenance of existing facilities and future construction plans.  It would provide the vision, consensus and concrete plan that would provide the groundwork for both a future capital levy and applications for matching grants. 

Priority 2:  Fund UV Treatment for Existing Pools.  Cost Estimate:  $350,000 

UV treatment is needed for 6 pools in Seattle to deal with an emerging threat to human health (cryptosporidium, an organism that produces symptoms similar to E Coli but resists chlorine treatment).  UV treatment could increase schedulable pool hours by 15% without adding a single pool, plus increase energy efficiency.  This is not maintenance funding—UV systems have never existed for these pools.  UV systems have been added to some pools out of budgets for energy conservation (!?!); however, co-opting energy funds to deal with a health issue is not an effective (or timely) way to deal with the problem.  The triple bang-for-the-buck (health, potential hours and efficiency) make this project a real win-win.

Priority 3:  Fund a Warm Water Therapy/Teaching Pool Add-On.  Cost Estimate:  $420,000

Today’s pools are one-size-fits-all, so they fail to serve a wide range of needs.  Adding a warm-water therapy pool at an existing pool site would broaden accessibility of the pool system and increase pool time for all users.  There is an existing, cost-estimated Parks plan for adding a warm water therapy pool beyond a bulkhead at Helene Madison pool.  Parks chose this location as the best place to put the first warm water pool because of very high demand, high concentration of seniors, relative ease (accessibility, space) of implementation and current high utility costs (worst of all pools).  This project is listed in the Parks Department’s Capital Improvement Plan. 

Note:  These proposals were identified using the criteria provided here for weighing levy proposals.

UPDATE:  The levy proposal has just been posted on the city council web site.  There is one water-focused item: "Convert two wading pools to spray parks."