The Mayor of Ashcroft is hoping to have the outdoor community pool reopened soon as temperatures warm up.
“We’ve got two pool staff back, and they’re doing work at the building. We’re liasing with them and other village crew about what its going to look like to reopen the pool,” Barbara Roden told NL News.
“Our plan is to have that pool open this summer. We don’t know when and we don’t want to give people a date because I don’t want to get hopes up or find some wrinkle comes in that we hadn’t expected.”
Roden says pools were never ordered to close by health officials, but notes it’s important to ensure that both staff and users are comfortable with safety measures that are put in place.
“Like making sure when people are lined up for the diving board they are standing two metres apart, and clearing away any deck furniture you might have on the deck, and just about extra sanitizing,” she noted.
“So there’s lots of discussions going on with staff now about what its going to look like to operate the pool, what sort of new rules do we have to have in place. Once we get all that hammered out, we hope to be able to open the doors and get people splashing around.”
Ashcroft’s outdoor pool is usually open from Victoria Day to Labour Day, similar to the Brock outdoor pool in Kamloops, which is usually open from June to September. There’s no word yet on when the Brock pool will reopen.
Interior Health Guidelines
Interior Health’s Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Sue Pollock, says to expect new guidelines around pool safety to be released very soon.
“We’re in Phase Two [of the province’s restart plan] right now. Pools are going to be allowed to reopen and its true, its not about the water. There’s no evidence of transmission of COVID-19 through water, especially when its chlorinated water that would be in pools,” she noted, during a town hall on Monday.
Pollock says there is a higher risk of COVID-19 transmission in changing rooms and on the pool deck, if people are not maintaining social distancing.
“So that’s what the guidelines will help provide recommendations for in terms of enhanced cleaning, but also the spacing that will be needed,” she said.
