PORT ANGELES – The Port Angeles Swim Club has a problem.
When the William Shore Memorial Pool closes next month for a major renovation project, the 70 or so members of the club, all between the ages of 6 and 18 years, will lose their practice facility for over a year.
Enter Port Angeles chiropractor James Halberg who, in February, offered to let the club use a two-lane, 25-yard pool at his office on Lauridsen Boulevard. The only catch is that the pool hasn’t been used in many years and needs about $20,000 in relatively minor repairs.
Club members took up the challenge and started a fundraising campaign that begins with this weekend’s carwash. But now head coach Jessica Johnson says the Washington State Water Recreation Department has come in and dashed those plans.
If that just meant putting up safety signs and painting lines on the bottom of the pool where the depth changes, no problem. But Johnson says it goes way beyond that.
The YMCA in Sequim offered to let the club use their pool on a limited basis, but it wouldn’t come close to the athlete’s needs. Many of these kids have been training all their lives, and thought they were losing their pool for a few months. It wasn’t until later that pool officials announced a change of plans and the pool would be closed for a year.
Johnson says it could very well cost some of these kids their shot at a scholarship.