This article is really important. My kids have aged out but the schedule at Ives is a clear reflection of the city's lack of focus and care for families. As a lap swimmer and someone over 50, I still fail to see how children having pool time is not the absolutely #1 priority of a municipal pool. I realize the pool is not municipal but it has that mission, and instead it caters to a mostly adult and paying clientele - or a paid swim team. I realize the city is in no place to financially support the pool because the city council has chronically mismanaged the budget so there is probably no answer. But this gets to our priorities, just like the proposal for the soccer fields downtown.
I have lived in Sebastopol for 34 years and have used our wonderful Ives Pool all of these years - from the yearly times with young children to my retirement years as a regular lap swimmer and Aqua Aerobics participant.
We are so fortunate to have Ives Pool and even more fortunate that our pool serves our WHOLE community - from toddlers to the elderly, from the able bodied to the physically challenged. This diversity of programs is the best! Most programs would like more pool time, but to serve the full range of needs, no one program gets all it wants and that is OK by me as a die-hard aquatics advocate.
The fact is our local swim team, the Sebastopol Sea Serpents, has a contract with WSCS to run their practices during the 3-6:30 "prime time" that this article takes issue with not being available for Recreational Swim. If you live in Sebastopol, you know how important SSS is to our kids and families.
Let's be grateful for what we have and for the volunteer board that keeps the pool going so well, and for our Aquatics Director has operated the pool so well for over 20 years!
Like so many things in Sebastopol, resources go to those with money and free time to advocate (and complain). It's hard enough for working families to get to the pool, going to a board meeting for pool access advocacy doesn't really feel viable.
Thank you for asking this question and for this article!
14 hours of public swim a week and they are touting that? That is appaling if they are open 12 hours a day for 7 days= 84 hours a week. That's 16.7% of the available time for open swim. The lap swimmers run the show over there. We stopped going when they would kick us and our kids out at 2:45 with three of the hottest hours of the day to go. It's not a solution if you need to cool down- cuz then what?!
Rather than just complain, here's a suggestion- Adopt a "Spare the Heat" policy. When the temp is over, say, 80 degrees, have extended open swim hours through 6pm using the kiddie pool and a couple lanes in the deep end. People need places to cool off, and our rivers and the coast are far away, can be costly or prohibitive for some families, and are crowded. A program like that may see increased interest and actually bring in more revenue, as well as get people to stop referring to the Ives Pool as the "Lap Swimmers Pool" or less nice names I will not share here.
This article is really important. My kids have aged out but the schedule at Ives is a clear reflection of the city's lack of focus and care for families. As a lap swimmer and someone over 50, I still fail to see how children having pool time is not the absolutely #1 priority of a municipal pool. I realize the pool is not municipal but it has that mission, and instead it caters to a mostly adult and paying clientele - or a paid swim team. I realize the city is in no place to financially support the pool because the city council has chronically mismanaged the budget so there is probably no answer. But this gets to our priorities, just like the proposal for the soccer fields downtown.
I have lived in Sebastopol for 34 years and have used our wonderful Ives Pool all of these years - from the yearly times with young children to my retirement years as a regular lap swimmer and Aqua Aerobics participant.
We are so fortunate to have Ives Pool and even more fortunate that our pool serves our WHOLE community - from toddlers to the elderly, from the able bodied to the physically challenged. This diversity of programs is the best! Most programs would like more pool time, but to serve the full range of needs, no one program gets all it wants and that is OK by me as a die-hard aquatics advocate.
The fact is our local swim team, the Sebastopol Sea Serpents, has a contract with WSCS to run their practices during the 3-6:30 "prime time" that this article takes issue with not being available for Recreational Swim. If you live in Sebastopol, you know how important SSS is to our kids and families.
Let's be grateful for what we have and for the volunteer board that keeps the pool going so well, and for our Aquatics Director has operated the pool so well for over 20 years!
Virginia Anderegg
Like so many things in Sebastopol, resources go to those with money and free time to advocate (and complain). It's hard enough for working families to get to the pool, going to a board meeting for pool access advocacy doesn't really feel viable.
Thank you for asking this question and for this article!
14 hours of public swim a week and they are touting that? That is appaling if they are open 12 hours a day for 7 days= 84 hours a week. That's 16.7% of the available time for open swim. The lap swimmers run the show over there. We stopped going when they would kick us and our kids out at 2:45 with three of the hottest hours of the day to go. It's not a solution if you need to cool down- cuz then what?!
Rather than just complain, here's a suggestion- Adopt a "Spare the Heat" policy. When the temp is over, say, 80 degrees, have extended open swim hours through 6pm using the kiddie pool and a couple lanes in the deep end. People need places to cool off, and our rivers and the coast are far away, can be costly or prohibitive for some families, and are crowded. A program like that may see increased interest and actually bring in more revenue, as well as get people to stop referring to the Ives Pool as the "Lap Swimmers Pool" or less nice names I will not share here.
Ives is a wonderful resource for Sebastopol and county residents.