Willow Glen Resident

News

Citywide plan to overhaul its pools leaves Biebrach's high and dry

By Eli Segall

With summer officially winding down, San Jose residents are finally feeling some relief from the blistering summer of 2006. For those in the North Willow Glen, Gardner and Gregory Plaza neighborhoods, relief is bittersweet; their public pool was closed in May 2005, with no reopening in sight.

"We'll work with any other neighborhood on this issue," said Kevin Christman, an active community member and former chairman of the Greater Gardner Coalition. "This is bigger than any one group can take on."

Last year a study showed Gardner Community Center's 35-year-old Biebrach pool, on the corner of Virginia Street and Delmas Avenue, required more than $1.8 million in repairs and upgrades. The study analyzed all six public pools in San Jose. Based on the findings, the city closed four pools, including Biebrach, before the summer 2005 swim season began.

The closures were attributed to inadequate revenue streams, dilapidated conditions and various health and safety code violations.

Cynthia Bojorquez, deputy director of San Jose Department of Parks, Recreation and Neighborhood Services, said most of the city's pools were built in the 1930s. Poor maintenance, as well as more comprehensive health and safety standards, have left several knee-deep in violations.

The city began efforts to overhaul the entire aquatic system last October, when the city council approved $250,000 for a residents' aquatic needs study through the consulting group Counsilman-Hunsaker.

Ten months later, on Aug. 31, the parks and recreation department indicated how the study's funds would be applied in its 2006 citywide aquatics master plan.

The plan will analyze telephone and written surveys, group interviews and community meetings to learn people's preferences on pool size, play areas and other amenities.

The consulting firm will present a progress report of its findings to the city council Dec. 12.

Community members remain frustrated.

"If this were at a country club, it would have been repaired within a few weeks," said Harvey Darnell, chairman of the Greater Gardner Coalition. "The process of studying the situation delays reopening the pool by a year or two."

Community outreach is needed to learn what people who use a pool want from it, not only for themselves, but for their family and community, said Randy Mendioroz, president of Aquatic Design Group, whose company conducted the initial study that led to the pool closures.

Mendioroz has spent more than 20 years working with cities, universities and other areas of the public sector to build and analyze aquatic networks.

"Some people may want more lap and fitness, others need pools to teach kids how to swim, others just drop their kids off to play," he said. "Each neighborhood has different needs and desires.

"It's their tax dollars being spent, so you should ask them how it should be spent," he added.

Patty Mason, who moved to Gardner more than 45 years ago, disagrees. "If the city is planning to do it this way, it's the wrong way," she said. "If there is a process to reopen the pool, why was there no process to close it?"

Last May, Biebrach was closed unexpectedly and without warning, residents in the Gardner and Gregory Plaza neighborhoods said. Even community leaders, who speak with city officials and act as liaisons to the city, heard through friends the pool had been shut down.

"We were never given any indication over Biebrach's state of disrepair or possible closing," said Christman.

The Aquatic Design Group study said Biebrach has annual operating costs of almost $100,000, which supports more than 2,700 visitors annually. The pool fell short of the 17,600 visitors needed to generate the necessary revenue to cover at least half of its operating costs. The report stated this was "a minimum industry standard."

However, the pool's size and infrastructure can handle only 5,000 visitors per year.

The aging pool had numerous code violations that included inadequate pool-wall finishing, bathhouse floor covering, walk-out steps, lifeguard chair and depth markers; the pool's heater and filter, hair and lint strainer and other equipment have failed; and the bathhouse does not comply with federal disability requirements.

To date only one closed pool has been approved by the city for renovation. The council on Aug. 29 unanimously approved a new 75-foot pool at Mayfair Community Center, in addition to a new community center and skate park for the site.

Camden Community Center, 3369 Union Ave., has scheduled a community meeting on the aquatics master plan for Sept. 19 from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m.