Swimmers, parents protest crumbling OPRF pool

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1/6/11 Oak Park,IL The Oak Park-River Forest boys swimming team practices in the East Pool after it was re-opened in Oak Park on Jan. 6, 2011. The pool was scheduled to be finished with construction and upgrades in August but finally passed a health inspection by the state this week. | Rob Hart~Sun Times Media

Updated: February 27, 2012 8:47AM

Alarmed by the recent closure of the Oak Park-River Forest high school swim team’s diving board, nearly 80 students and parents gathered in the high school library Jan. 19, to voice their concerns directly the District 200 school board.

The controversy come one year after the 2011 girls swim team was forced out of the same pool for months, due to several code violations after mishandled repair work.

School officials removed the diving board from the school’s swimming pool in early January, citing safety precautions. They then discovered they couldn’t replace the board, after measurements showed the distance between the pool bottom and the ceiling violated state and federal diving board standards by five inches.

The closure of the diving board is only the latest gripe, many parents and students say.

A dozen students and parents spoke of dangerously slippery pool decks, crowded and inadequate deck space, broken tiles, rodent and insect infestation in the locker rooms, and a majority of showers that didn’t work.

“When we go into the pools, we don’t know what we’re going to find,” said one boy. “Dead rodents, cockroaches. Chlorine levels way too high.”

The speakers all asked the board to find a way to replace the antiquated pool facility, either on its own or in cooperation with other taxing bodies.

“Is there any opposition (to that idea)?” Dee Millard asked. As the audience looked about and laughed, she added, “I didn’t think so.”

Luke Cassin, the parent of swimmers, urged officials to act soon.

“It’s pretty clear the school is in need, the community is in need,” he said. “This is truly your opportunity to step forward, pull in the other agencies, with the park district, and the village and get them on board with what you need.”

“It’s not about planning, it’s about implementation,” Cassin added.

Park District executive director Gary Balling wasn’t at the Thursday meeting, but he suggested Monday that any cooperative agreement to build and operate a shared pool facility would require a lot of planning.

At an October community meeting on a new Ridgeland Common pool, Balling said, “quite a few people talked of wanting an indoor pool.”

He also said prior talks with the YMCA about a possible cooperative agreement focused on “was about what can we do next.”

Balling said, park district staff was expected to meet with officials from the Oak Park YMCA on Jan. 25, and District 200 officials have been invited to attend.

Planning for rebuilding the 50-year-old Ridgeland Common pool area is ongoing, Balling noted, with a public meeting scheduled for Feb. 9 to show preliminary designs.

Asked about the possibility of some sort of cooperative effort on a shared facility, Balling agreed that “the timing isn’t perfect, but the door hasn’t closed.”

Tim Kelly, the parent of two OPRF swimmers, said the OPRF pool, which was built in the 1920, is well past its useful life.

“In my lifetime, we’ve had two new main libraries, while the pools haven’t been touched,” Kelly said Tuesday. “My recommendation as a citizen and a construction professional is to start over. The smart thing to do is start fresh.”

He estimated that once a design is approved — which could take some time — demolition and construction work would take about a year.

Millard promised her audience on Thursday night that the board would conduct both an assessment of pool conditions and what it would cost to fix the problem. Board members asked Superintendent Steven Isoye to provide them with both the costs of pool repairs in recent years, and annual maintenance costs.

“It would help us in our evaluating,” said board member Terry Finnegan.