Supervisors ponder donation to McKinley pool

Union County Board of Supervisors did not take any action Monday on requests for donations to the McKinley Park Aquatic Center project.

The project is a significant remodeling plan to bring more features and conveniences to those who use the city-owned swimming pool.

Committee members Sam Baird and Jeremy Rounds explained the project and funding to the supervisors. Rounds suggested a $50,000 donation from the county which can be paid $10,000 a year for five years.

“That would make sense for this project,” he said. “It’s an amount that wouldn’t be embarrassing also an amount that wouldn’t have a huge hit on the budget every year.”

The entire work is estimated at $1.8 million. Of that amount, $1,070,000 has been raised so far. A $200,000 endowment has been included.

“The endowment is really important to major repairs and operational costs for a larger facility going forward to supplement the city’s costs involved,” Baird said.

Baird said phase one of the work has a zero-entrance to the baby pool, climbing wall, a splash pad, water heater and a retractable fence to McKinley Park.

“The park would be available to those who have paid admission to the pool,” Baird said about the fence.

Rounds said plans are to apply for additional grants. One of them is a Community and Tourism Grant valued at $200,000. Rounds said part of the application for that grant requires the applicant have funds either through a partnering city or county. Rounds said Creston and Union County projects have had success receiving CAT grants in the past, but this year has much more competition because there is a “backlog of projects.”

“They want to see buy in from the county,” asked Supervisor Dennis Brown about the grant application.

Rounds said he knows of rural, Union County residents who are in support of the project and have donated.

“The interest throughout the county is out there,” Rounds said.

Baird said she knows of rural residents who were let down the project lost in a bond election.

The pool was part of a $6 million bond election in 2019 for city facilities voters vetoed. Baird and Rounds said the city was recently asked a $500,000 donation to the pool.

“They were disappointed they couldn’t vote for the project because they didn’t live within the city limits,” Baird said.

Rounds said city swimming pools typically do not profit, but are still an attraction for the town and people from other places to attend. He explained how people from Creston or Union County are using pools in Corning or Winterset.

“Our goal is to reverse that trend and get more people to come into the county,” Rounds said. “But operational costs will increase. We want to keep Union County people in Union County spending those dollars here, but also draw from the outside.”