Pool closes in Stanwood

A cardio and weight room will replace Stanwood’s only competitivelength pool.

Brett Olson, the owner of the former Sports Club building, which currently houses Team Fitness, said the pool’s ventilation system failed on Tuesday and to replace it would be cost prohibitive.

The 20-ton ventilation system would cost $54,000. In addition, the 16-year-old roof would have to be replaced at a cost of $192,000, bringing the total to $246,000. The new system could only be installed through the currently decaying roof and would close the area to the public for 18 weeks, he said.

“We’ve been struggling for a long time,” said Olson. “Their (Team Fitness) overhead is so high. The pool doesn’t make any money.”

Olson is the landlord of Team Fitness owned by Mike Liberato who owned two clubs here.

Since Team Fitness downtown closed, and members were funneled into one location, membership has declined rapidly, said Olson.

“Members are dropping left and right,” he said. “We need to stabilize.”

The former downtown location is not a feasible alternative site because its pool is not regulation size. Olson is in negotiations with a convalescent care facility to lease the former club.

A construction engineer is currently working on plans to fill in the pool at the uptown location to ultimately build a cardio and weight room over it. It would replace the cramped space currently in use at the athletic club. Olson estimates the cost of filling in the pool, providing a new cardio/weight area, remodeling both locker rooms and saunas, at about $200,000.

Rita Brennan, co-coach of Stanwood High School (SHS) boys and girls’ swim teams with Art Wiper, learned the news on Saturday. She said that the loss of a competitivelength pool is devastating to the community.

“There is no other competitive pool in our area,” she said. “The closure of the pool impacts us greatly.”

The Stanwood-Camano School District leases the private pool for practices and meets, as does the private Stilly swim club. SHS swim teams consist of 55 girls and 40 boys.

Before the athletic club pool opened in 1994, there were no school swim teams. Since then, SHS swim teams have come from being last at area, regional and state meets, to being top contenders, said Brennan.

“Both teams have the most winning swimmers we’ve ever had,” she said. “All that would be gone again.”

When the SHS girls swim team first began with 30 members, most had not had any formal swim lessons. When the girls’ season began last fall only eight of the 55 members didn’t know how to swim, she said.

The closest regulationlength pool (25-yards long and six-lanes wide) is in Mount Vernon. The Country Club pool on Camano Island does not qualify at 20-yards and less than sixlanes wide. Without a pool, school teams here could no longer exist, Brennan said.

Brennan said she is launching a community fundraising drive to keep a pool in Stanwood.

“I would love it to be community owned, but my priority is keeping a 25 yard, six- lane pool in Stanwood,” she said.

To get involved in fundraising efforts, call Brennan at 629-1300, ext. 2233 or e-mail her at rbrennan@ stanwood.wednet.edu.