Passage of Los Altos Measure A may be hindered by inlcuding a pool facility. In the 2012 survey of voters, a pool was NOT important to likely voters.
One Big Source of NO Votes? – Inclusion of Pool facility?
In the fall of 2014 the City Council convinced themselves that adding a pool facility to the Hillview site and also to a single city bond measure would add “sizzle” and help sell the new community center building project to the public. Instead it feels like they are stirring up a lot of likely NO votes by including the pool. An earlier city council comprised of Val Carpenter, Ron Packard, Megan Satterlee, David Casas and Jarrett Fishpaw zoned the Civic Center Master Plan of 2009 to create the possibility of a pool, leaving a location for a pool. However, that council never, ever agreed to finance its construction with a bond or to use city monies for its operation. It would have to be a privately funded construction and operation.
The ABORTED 2012 Civic Center Bond WOULD HAVE left the Civic Center site looking like the above AFTER the proposed but cancelled Phase I $85M bond. You can see that immediate residential neighbors WOULD HAVE enjoyed reduced traffic and more green space. No neighbor seemed worse off. Phase II was NEVER going to be city funded and was unlikely to ever happen. Thus, it was likely the expanse of green space along Hillview Ave. would remain there undeveloped for decades. The neighbors seemed pleased with the Master Plan 2009.
Publicly funded and owned pool OR just zoned for pool?
Lalahpolitico suspects that in 2012 many Hillview Avenue area neighbors felt that although there was zoning for a pool in the 2009 Master Plan, there was not a snowball’s chance in hell that pool advocates would be able to self-fund the construction in Phase II of the Master Plan 2009. For years and years pool advocates had not been able to raise enough money.
Also the pool has previously been rejected as a “neighbor.” About 10 years ago, Splash tried to include a pool in the City’s Rosita Park improvement project. Covington School neighbors litigated and EIRed the pool out of their neighborhood. Furthermore in the 2012 Goodbe survey of voter support for the aborted 2012 bond measure, the pool came in dead last as “an important issue for the city.” The pool was NOT part of the proposed Civic Center 2012 $85M bond measure Phase I.
Measure A includes about $5 M to build a pool complex, which will abut neighbors who don’t want a public pool for a neighbor. Selfish of them? How would you feel? The pool operations are to be outsourced to a for-profit operator. Risky for the city which owns the pool? How do you feel about the drought? Some say pools use a lot less water than lawns. Certainly residential pools can be covered most of the day and night. But public pools, not so much? Yet kids need to learn to swim somewhere.
Today, the No on Measure A supporters point out that the city OWNING the pool facility will create a risk that the city could become fiscally responsible for annual pool operations. Although Splash – the pool foundation – has made a good case that outsourcing operations is profitable for the operator and is an arrangement that is self-sustaining, Lalahpolitico supposes it is possible that the City Recreation Department staff could suddenly have to expand if the operator throws in the towel!. The one-time cost of constructing the pool is only $5M or so, but ongoing operations could become publicly funded or even staffed by public sector union employees in the future. However, Lalah does not think this is a big risk.
Yet there is precedent for services that were once privately funded in Los Altos becoming tax-payer funded. For example the History Museum Director salary evolved from a part-time privately funded salary to a full-time, half city funded, to 100% city funded recently. The Public Art program, which has been displaying art that is loaned for free by the artists, is considering purchasing some art.
