A design for a replacement for the shuttered Norplex Pool will no longer be ready in the spring, the city’s recreation and community services committee heard at their March 16 meeting.
In February, recreation and community services director Sonya Wiseman told the committee that a design report including recommendations on possible locations for a new pool and the best ones based on the city and pool committee’s needs and wants would be ready by April or May.
A month later, she said the design will be delayed until October or November, though a floor plan has been completed.
Coun. Les Ellsworth asked if this would have any effect on the city’s grant applications for funding towards new pool construction cots.
“It would have really no effect on that,” said city manager Anthony McInnis. “As far as we know, there’s still no timeline for those announcements.”
In October 2019, council passed a resolution seeking an Investing in Canada Infrastructure Program (ICIP) grant, which would cover 76 per cent of an estimated total cost of $20 million for a new pool, with the city chipping in just over $5 million.
The provincial government told the city in late October of last year that it had sent its list of prioritized projects under the ICIP to the federal government and that, once projects are approved at the federal level, the provincial government will provide provincial funds immediately to allow planning and construction to begin as quickly as possible.
Earlier in the March meeting, committee members discussed plans to possibly demolish the Juniper wading pool this year.
“The plan for this year would be to … basically remove it … and the council is looking to possibly put a new one in next year but that would have to be decided through next year’s [budget] deliberation,” said McInnis.
Recreation committee chair Coun. Braden McMurdo said he would like to see large recreational expenditures directed towards a new indoor pool, rather than another splash pad.
“A splash pad, while it may be great, is far less, I think, important right now going on to our third year without a pool so my thoughts say our large cap recreational expenditures, really the priority should be the pool.”
Mayor Collen Smook said the advantage of a splash pad is that it can be competed more quickly.
“We know by next year it’s going to be up and running where the pool … we know that’s a few years away,” she said.
