Submitted by FLIP
“Where’s the pool?” “How’re you doing with funding?” “When will you start construction?” These and many other eager questions about a community pool for Lopez greet FLIP volunteers at Friends of Lopez Island Pool public events.
“Everyone wants to swim in a community pool,” commented Leslie Quenell, who staffed the FLIP Farmers’ Market booth for two summers collecting support and distributing pool information. Enthusiastic grass-roots island support has accompanied each development phase, from the first SPLASH friend-raiser through construction and operation feasibility studies, facility design, zoning approval and donation of the pool land on Center Road. FLIP-sponsored Lopez Kids Swim days at Fidalgo Pool now introduce the island’s many young non-swimmers to water safety each year, while individually sponsored swimmers don wetsuits and bravely cross chilly MacKaye Harbor to raise funds and interest. Supporters throughout the island also showed their stuff by posing for the 2014 FLIP Calendar (available at Paper Scissors, the Bookshop, and the Southend General Store)!
This June FLIP commissioned a planning study guided by professional campaign counsel, the first step of its capital campaign to raise construction funds and a healthy operating endowment. The study tested a number of funding and construction scenarios among a population of development-savvy islanders, including the use of a junior taxing district for 50 percent of the funding, and a less expensive single outdoor pool rather than a 30 x 40-foot therapy/rehab pool paired with a 75-foot four-lane lap pool available year-round. Study participants indicated concerns with the overall project cost, ongoing operating expenses, use of a new tax district for part of the funding, and the need to support already existing services on the Island. These concerns were too much to offset a nearly unanimous desire among participants to have a pool, or the respect the community has for FLIP’s work to date.
“It’s clear that Lopez Island would enjoy having and using a community pool,” campaign counsel Brent Hafele reported. However, his confidential interviews brought into the light issues of more pressing community priorities, along with a slowly recovering economy, as concerns that would block the feasibility of funding a pool at this time. The Friends of Lopez Island Pool (FLIP) learned from recently received results that project costs were unlikely to be sufficiently funded as currently presented.
The FLIP Board has accepted the study’s recommendations to postpone efforts to build a pool. While this decision was clear given the study results, it was also hard to accept given many years of effort and the support of hundreds of island residents and visitors of every age. Lopez School third grader Rylee knows how hard it is: when it came time to get out of the water at the last Lopez Kids Swim day at Fidalgo Pool, Rylee sobbed, “This is the most fun I’ve had all year, and now it’s over!” Board members Linda Barton, Robin Bergstrom, Lori Taylor, Leslie Quenell and Micki Ryan say let’s not think of it as “over”, but rather as treading water, a smart safety measure to conserve resources.
“On behalf of the FLIP Board, thank you to all the generous donors and supporters of the pool effort,” states Linda Barton, FLIP Board President. “While our focus is changing, our mission has not.”
FLIP will continue to advocate for water safety, fitness, and fun. Future plans include continuing a partnership with the Lopez Island School District to sponsor swim days at Fidalgo Pool in Anacortes. FLIP will also continue scholarships for summer swimming lessons in partnership with the Family Resource Center. FLIP will retain ownership of the pool land and develop its water and sanitation resources in preparation for a change in funding outlook. Finally, should the economic conditions change, FLIP will reconsider the pursuit of a community pool.
To learn more visit our website: www.lopezislandpool.org.
