Residents proposing the concept of a municipal swimming pool at Carolina Beach enjoyed unanimous support from the town’s leadership Tuesday.
The Carolina Beach Town Council cast a 5-0 vote toward the development of a modern, year-round aquatics center adjacent to the town’s existing recreation center off North Lake Park Boulevard.
The eyed design is a 25-yard, eight-lane, NCAA-compliant pool–open air in the summer and under a “bubble” dome in the cold months–with a zero-entry shallow end and a diving well on the other.
Not a done deal, the project awaits complete development documents, a bidding process and financial details, but the town’s ad hoc Aquatics Committee–established for this project, specifically–offered up some rough costs Tuesday.
In a video presentation to council members, the committee’s Duke Hagestrom said building the community pool could range $900,000-$1.15 million while annual operations could cost $289,000-$314,000. Citing “conservative” membership projections, annual revenues could come in between $232,000-$366,000.
The “most likely” scenario puts the project right in the middle of the numbers, with the pool costing a flat $1 million to build.
“The bottom line is that our most likely scenario would see the town breaking even with a swing of about $50,000 one way or the other,” Hagestrom said.
The committee proposes an admission schedule for visitors that offers cheaper rates for Carolina Beach residents, starting with a base membership intended to cover overhead and administrative costs. They would range from $40 yearly for individual residents to $60 yearly for Carolina Beach families.
Non-residents would have higher base rates, at $80 for individuals and $120 for families.
From there, members who plan to use the pool every so often would have access to punch-cards allowing visits for just a few dollars each. Those who plan to use the pool regularly could buy annual passes at $200 per individual resident or $340 per Carolina Beach family, with higher rates for non-residents.
The plan also notes a 15-percent discount on all costs for senior citizens, a 20-percent discount for users who’ve additionally bought town recreation center memberships, and $10 per-individual and $30 per-family day passes for visitors.
Hagestrom said this pool would be more affordable for residents than other aquatics facilities in the area, by as much as 30 percent compared to the YWCA pool on College Road in Wilmington and 50 percent less than the YMCA on Market Street.
With the town council’s supportive vote Tuesday, “They are allowing us to proceed with developing construction documents … that resemble what the pool will really be like, and construction companies can decide how much [money it would cost] to build it to those specs,” said Hagestrom.
He noted the town’s residents are not unanimous in support of the pool and cited surveys, with roughly 1,400 respondents between them, that showed 55-percent favor.
Sometimes surfacing against the proposal to spend tax dollars as such is an argument that Carolina Beach already has the ocean to enjoy, or that swimming pools already exist in some area neighborhoods, Hagestrom acknowledged Wednesday. But he said anyone who doesn’t understand the town pool concept needs only to observe the fervor for sport and recreational swimming, which he said is on scale with youth soccer.
He added the push for a town pool is at least 15 years old.
Ahead for Carolina Beach’s leadership is understanding the project’s budget impacts and seeing complete development plans before a bid process and finance arrangements.
Ben Brown is a news reporter at Port City Daily. Reach him at [email protected] or (910) 772-6335. On Twitter: @benbrownmedia
