With New Year’s Eve just over a week away and this being our last print edition of the year before our staff departs for two weeks of vacation, it only seems fitting for thoughts to tun to 2023 and to engage in that time-honoured tradition of making New Year’s resolutions.
No one wants to hear a newspaper editor’s resolutions (“Edit harder; drink less,” or perhaps vice versa) and it’s easier to give advice to someone else than it is to follow one’s own or that which others have given to you, so this goal for the next year is directed at the City of Thompson and the members of city council. And, as you may have guessed if you read the headline, it’s a pretty simple one. Start building that long-awaited new pool.
It’s nearly Christmas and none of us want to think too hard, but here’s a little math for you. Less than eight weeks after this newspaper hits the streets, Thompson will have gone four years without an indoor city-operated pool. Four years without swimming lessons, aquacize, a swim club, chilling n the sauna, indoor kayak lessons, the list goes on and on. Kids who were in first grade when the pool was last open are practically in junior high now and they haven’t been to a pool party in all that time.
Looking forward, it will most likely be the summer or fall of 2024 at the earliest before a new pool can actually open its doors to the public, based on a previous construction time estimate of 18 months. By the time that happens, Thompson will have gone the better part of six years without a pool.
Of course, the most important numbers when it comes to building a successor to the long-dead Norplex Pool are the ones that come with a dollar sign in front of them. The city has $13 million committed to the project from the federal and provincial governments and Vale, combined, and needs to put in at least $4 million itself, which could include donations it has received, such as Vale’s $2 million. And even though $15 million is a lot of money, it’s basically common knowledge that the pool the city wants is going to cost another $5 million or so at least. Council and city administration have to find that money somewhere while also paying for everything else going on, like the city’s share of five-year road and sewer renewal programs. That’s what the elected officials signed up for. what needs to be done, as mentioned above, is simple, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy. But the rewards are clear. Having a pool once again will make Thompson a nicer place to live, particularly over the course of its long, cold, dark winters. And the mayor and council who get the job done will be remembered as the people on whose watch Thompson opened a new pool. The previous group of elected officials, though they started the process and laid the groundwork and ultimately helped the city nail down millions of dollars in commitments, will always be the ones who shut one down. One of those is clearly a much better legacy.
