When voters said no to the mill levy and bond questions for a proposed $30 million recreation and aquatic center in the Nov. 2 election, it was a resounding no.
The Cañon City Area Metropolitan Recreation and Park District Board of Directors is formulating a plan for what to do next to replace the current R.C. Icabone Pool, which, officials say, is pretty much nothing.
At least for now.
Unless community members or groups come forward with a plan that includes a whole lot of cash, the board doesn’t consider it worthwhile to spend tens of thousands of dollars on new surveys, focus groups, renderings and another election at this time.
Kyle Horne, the executive director of the recreation district, conducted more than 30 community informational meetings and visited individually with supporters and opponents of the issue during the entire campaign. A local citizen community group, Recreation Enhances Our Community, also invested a lot of time, money and effort, but in the end, board president Jim Johnson said there simply was an overwhelming response of “no new taxes.”
Question 6A was a mill levy question that would have raised the district’s current mill levy of 3.509 to 7.009 to help fund the operations and maintenance of the proposed recreation center, as well as ongoing recreation district operations and building reserves for the recreation center.
Question 6B was a $30 million bond measure that would have funded the construction and equipping of the proposed recreation center.
The Issue 6A operating mill levy proposal was turned down with 5,414 votes against the question and 3,747 in favor. Issue 6B, the general obligation bonds question, was turned down with 5,268 votes against the question and 3,898 in favor.
Cañon City voters reject proposed community recreation and aquatic center
The board felt there was a lot of false information spread across the community, especially on social media, and, perhaps, some people didn’t understand how governmental agencies work and where their tax dollars actually go.
“The user fees were an issue,” Horne said. “The way we tried to present it was if you are looking to get 100% cost recovery at a rec center, you are going to have to charge a rate where a good portion of the community will not be able to afford to use it. Recreation centers try to serve the socio-economic dynamics of the community, so what we do now with all of our programs, swim lessons and the pool, if you want to make it affordable for the community as a whole so that everybody can use, it, then there has to be some subsidy because you are serving the community.”
This campaign focused on making it affordable for all taxpayers within the community, he said.
“For whatever reason, I don’t think that was known well,” he said. “I don’t think the people understood that piece of it. It is a model that is working well in many communities.”
Board member Greg Dirito said the effectiveness of the misinformation campaign really goes to prove that someone can put a lot of effort and energy into building something or making something happen, but it doesn’t take a lot of energy to destroy it.
“It was disappointing, but all we can do is take our lumps and move forward past this and continue to do what we do and do our best with what we have,” he said.
Despite the outcome of the election, the issues with the R.C. Icabone Pool have not changed. The pool opened in 1966 with a life expectancy of about 25 to 30 years. A professional site audit in 2018 said it likely would need to close within the next one to three years.
The board will reopen it in May 2022, but it will be subject to any catastrophic failure that would close it for good.
An engineer has already made it clear that the pool has many deficiencies and has far exceeded its useful life, Horne said. Those deficiencies, board member Mike Sallie said, include the pipe could collapse, the liner could fall out or crack, sand filters could start leaking and go out, and the drain is past due to be changed, which costs thousands of dollars.
“There is any number of things that can go wrong with the pool that we don’t have the money to keep going,” Sallie said. “We are going to open it as planned, but if there is a catastrophic failure – it’s closed. We are not going to throw any more money at it.”
To consider looking at completely replacing the pool at its current location, it would cost about $20,000 for an engineering study and a minimum of $6 million to build it, Horne said. It also would cost about $100,000 annually to subsidize it. A GOCO grant might help with the cost, but only about 5%.
“There will have to be a mill levy increase go with it,” he said. “There has to be. You’re looking at another two questions that have to pass.”
Johnson said when the local pickleball user group wanted new courts, they came up with funding for matching grants, which expedited the process. The same thing likely will have to happen if the community wants a new pool.
“I don’t think it would be prudent for us to go for another tax increase in May or next year,” Johnson said. “They already told us no and it was a pretty loud no. A lot of the ones that voted no are just a hard no to any tax increase. I think until we have a hardship with the pool and it’s not available to kids, and it gets loud, I don’ think we’ll have a shot.”
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November 11, 2021 at 04:05AM
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After a resounding no to proposed center, Cañon City recreation board unsure of pool’s future - Canon City Daily Record
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