Correction: City Needs an Extra $94,000 for Ebster Pool Renovations
Decatur Metro | November 4, 2013
My apologies! See my corrections below and in the headline.
On the agenda for tonight’s Decatur City Commission meeting: providing $1 million more to renovate Ebster Pool.
Back in August, the city estimated $1 million to renovate Ebster Pool with the following new amenities:
- Changes to the pool to reduce its length from 25 meters to 25 yards and to widen the pool to provide 8 lanes for competitive swimming.
- Overhead lighting to allow longer hours for swimming meets.
- New mechanical systems to replace the original filtration tanks and pumps installed when the pool was built over 30 years ago.
- Complete renovation of the bathhouse to include new men’s and women’s changing rooms, a family changing room, new staff office.
- New lift for disabled swimmers, new water fountains, fencing and other amenities
Now a letter from Deputy City Manager Hugh Saxon states that the pool renovation will cost an additional $1,094,000 to complete the project as part of the Beacon Hill complex development. That’s an extra $94,000. Mr. Saxon says that there are still funds to in the project’s larger budget to cover the increase.
In an effort to limit costs Mr. Saxon notes…
…we are planning to re-use existing shade structures and to rough-in a spray pad. As we get closer to completing the entire Beacon project. We’ll be better able to determine whether we can add back the equipment for the spray pad.
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A $1M dollar estimate turns into $2.1M?
Insane.
Who is providing the initial crappy estimates? They need to be fired and the program reevaluated.
How much would it cost if the existing pool were not being shortened in one direction and lengthened in the other?
What changed that brought about more than doubling the cost for the project?
Saxon has a lot of gall in his memo to describe a more then 100% increase in the pool budget as “slightly higher than expected” – what would a big increase be?
In an update to the update, the contractor, Virtucon, is now asking for One Hundred Billion Dollars!
Color me surprised.
“Changes to the pool to reduce its length from 25 meters to 25 yards…”
And the metric system sustains another vicious blow…
The writers of Parks & Rec have you guys nailed. You are Eagleton.
You’re just cranky because you’ve got 6 families of noisy raccoons living under your house.
Also, I fell into a pit. Repeatedly.
Yes, but who does that make Pawnee?
All Decatur’s pools put together don’t measure up to Avondale’s “country club”
It is a nice facility. How does that work? Any resident can use it for a fee? Are there daily fees or is it more like a membership fee? Can non-residents use it for a fee, presumably higher than the resident fee?
Any resident can join the pool for an annual fee. There is no daily fee option for residents (at least I believe that’s the case). Non-resident guests can come for a nominal daily fee.
Anyone non-resident caught swimming without paying the daily fee spends a night in the box.
Annual membership is available but not required. There ARE daily fees for residents 2 and over, I think $3.00. And some of us get to enjoy free admission as seniors 60 and up with a pre-validated card. During the past summer a special no children hour existed early morning at Glenlake for lane swimming. The pools are a great value.
Clarification: These details are about CoD pools and not Avondale Estates.
Having just moved from un-incorporated Avondale Estates; no. Only city residents may join. No”daily” admission is allowed. Only city residents that pay the yearly membership fee can use the facility; unless you are a guest of a member. Even the Condos of Avondale, though in the city, are excluded from membership
What is the rationale for excluding condo residents? I have read that before and it seems exclusionary.
Public Works Projects 101, folks — take the initial estimate and triple it (kind of like my home improvement projects, come to think of it).
Or the cost of rearing children, quadruple it if you were figuring on college.
Or worse, my bar tab.
I’d like to correct this. The budget is NOT doubling to 2 million plus. The earlier number was Mr. Saxon’s estimate. Tonight’s number is what the Commission is being asked to approve and it is roughly 94,000.00 above his earlier estimate.
Oh shoot. Is that right? Thanks Fred. I’ll correct.
Thanks Fred – I knew there was a good reason why I voted for you this morning instead of that other guy!
So glad there are shade structures! The pool and sun are fun, but too much sun leads to skin cancer and cataracts, not to mention sunburn.