We've asked current Asheville City Council Candidates for their position on rebuilding Malvern Hills Pool and to answer the followign questions:
1. Do you support the funding of the necessary repairs to open the Malvern Hills Park pool for summer 2024?
2. What do you think is the best path forward to rebuild the Malvern Hills Park pool? What timeline would you like to see for this?
Below are their responses:
I support rebuilding the Malvern Hills Pool, a community-wide asset and historic landmark in West Asheville. Beyond home and commitments to work or school, public “third spaces” including parks, libraries, pools, community centers and gardens are affordable, accessible locations for residents to gather, connect, and build relationships that are key to neighborhood resiliency.
Asheville’s Pool History
With the recent closure of Malvern Hills Pool, concerns about deferred maintenance, process transparency, and meaningful community engagement are parallel to the closure of the Walton Street Pool in the historic, Black neighborhood of Southside. I recently heard from neighbors in Southside who feel let down by the smaller, shallow replacement pool at Grant Center, who remember the broken promises of the 2017 bond referendum and still call for rebuilding their pool that is now an historic landmark. As we consider why residents and summer camp participants from all over the city are using Malvern Hills Pool, I encourage friends and neighbors to learn more about the Walton Street Pool story, their petition, and the missed opportunity to save it too. United, we can expand the coalition advocating for equitable investment in public third spaces for ours and future generations!
My Commitment
Cities across the country are struggling to keep up with maintenance and operations of public pools. As outcomes of climate change include extreme summer temperatures as well as heat island effect in cities due to loss of tree canopy, income disparity and rising cost of living means residents might not have access to air conditioning, transportation, or pools with membership fees. I am committed to neighborhood resiliency, which looks like prioritizing Malvern Hills Pool in Asheville’s 2024 bond referendum, remembering the lessons learned from Walton Street Pool and the accountability required to ensure success. I will also continue to pursue funding solutions and partnerships to expedite reopening, and I remain committed to government transparency and open meetings policy to repair, grow, and maintain public trust in our processes.
We must have malvern hills pool for another hundred years.
(Note: As of April 2024, Councilwoman Turner has proposed making any City Council resolution on a Parks Bond referendum conditional to a commitment to rebuild Malvern Hills Pool)
Do I want the community to have access to a safe public pool in Malvern Hills this summer? Yes. Nothing about this situation gives me the confidence that swift, effective action could be taken in time to open the pool for this summer. Do I want it? Yes.
The elephant in the room is the fact that the Parks and Rec department has had such a long runway (since the 2017 assessment) to develop a plan for this key piece of infrastructure in its care, but instead has given notice of the pool’s closure three months before the traditional opening day of swim season.
My strong preference is for the pool to be renovated/replaced as quickly as possible.
Yes, Bo supports the funding/reopening of the Malvern Hills Pool. Community spaces are essential for improving mental health and contributing to well-rounded lives for our community.
Bo supports an expedited timeline for projects that impact our residents. Get the pool open by June 2024.
Bo supports looking into taking a percentage of TDA funding for city projects or other avenues that prioritize the people who actually live and work in our communities.
Because the Malvern Hills Park pool is city infrastructure, the best path forward would be for the city to fund the rebuild and subsequent maintenance directly. Core city services, including infrastructure, should be fully funded before the city contemplates spending money elsewhere. It is unfortunate that we’re in a really hard spot because there has been years of deferred maintenance. Had maintenance been prioritized, we would be in a better place now. I understand the reasoning behind the 2024 GO Bond, but we cannot adopt the resolution setting a Special Bond Referendum until July of 2024 and this will be too late to open the pool this year. The City needs to do the necessary repairs to open the pool this year and then fund the rebuild and actually perform the subsequent maintenance as it is needed. From what I have seen, it appears that the cost of repairs, around $400,000, is similar to what the City has approved for the purchase and installation of a new outdoor toilette. Though I will ultimately support a 2024 GO Bond that prioritizes city infrastructure and affordable housing, we cannot rely upon this cycle of years of deferred maintenance and then borrow money to get us out of our self-imposed hole.
Yes! I think that we should not ask for a generation of children to miss out on having local, affordable access to a public pool. I was disappointed but not surprised to hear that the city council decided to leave this issue alone for eight years, despite knowing that the repairs would be necessary. This is in-line with how they treat most of the infrastructure around Asheville. What did surprise me is that, at the Feb 21 meeting, city leaders indicated that they have no plan for the pool beyond hoping for the passing of a new Bond this coming November to give them the funds to (probably) tear out the old pool and place a new one. I was also disappointed that, despite knowing that the community was stung by this clear slap in our faces, the Mayor and City Manager had made no efforts to give us an idea of what the timeline would be for this future construction. Basing a comparison to what happened with the 2016 projects, we could expect between four and eight years. This could theoretically be an acceptable timeline if there was any planning to show that it would be at the lower section of the scale. However, there is no plan and it seemed clear from the Mayor's comments that if the bond doesn't pass, that there is no plans to save the pool in the future.
If I were to have my perfect answer, I would prefer to see the City change course on the $600k toilet. Use that money to fund the repair of Malvern Hills Pool. Reopen the public bathrooms at Haywood street and allot an extra security patrol through that area. Still ask for the Bond in November to make plans for an eventual rebuild of Malvern Hills and to update the existing architecture at Haywood Street to include the most important safety features of the Portland Loo idea. This maximizes utility to the public, reclaims a shuttered space, provides a warm place for everyone to use the bathroom, and makes a responsible plan to start working towards our future ideals. If a Portland Loo is the best use of taxpayer funds, let's put it on the Bond too instead of gatekeeping Malvern Hills Pool which is already a heavily used and relied upon feature of West Asheville.
However, I don't think that the Council will go for that. So, for we of West Asheville, what I would like to explore is the possibility of a private/public partnership to get us through the next two or more years. Someone at the meeting had joked about the "Bob Ingle Memorial Pool" but honestly, that may be a prudent path to save it and preserve the grandfathering until the we can find the funds to secure the future of Malvern Hills Pool.
If we are to be successful, we will have to act quickly. We need to have a discussion with the City about the pathway to repairs. Once we have that framework, we will need to simultaneously work on locking down all aspects of that frame while also engaging with businesses who might be willing to contribute to such a project. The season would likely be severely shortened, but my understanding is that if we can open at all this summer, we will have satisfied the rules to continue the pool's grandfathered status until a plan for replacement can be made.