Splash down
Pool closing Tuesday for month for repairs
BY PHIL REYNOLDS SOUTH JETTY REPORTER

Dedicated swimmers have four days as of today, Thursday, March 29, to get their laps in at the pool at Port Aransas Community Park. After that they'll have to use the Gulf of Mexico or find a friend with a backyard pool. On Tuesday, April 2, the pool will close for at least a month for renovations.

Port Aransas Parks and Recreation Director Gary Mysorski said the surface of the pool's apron is peeling and cracks have developed around the skimmer throats, the areas where water is exchanged in the pool. The pool's drains at the bottom have also developed cracks, besides the separation of the plaster lining the pool itself from the concrete shell designed to support the structure.

Paradise Pools of Agua Dulce won the contract for the repairs with the low bid of $92,788. That's $212 under the $93,000 repair budget the city council authorized in January.

The money for the repairs comes from the budget of the city's Recreational Development Corporation (RDC), which oversees the spending of a half-cent sales tax for recreational purposes.

"The good news - if there's good news about a $93,000 bill you didn't expect - is that the RDC is very good about saving money," City Manager Michael Kovacs told the council in January. He said the RDC has a reserve of about $250,000.

Mysorski said he didn't think the pool was badly constructed.

"The standard (pool) job is 8-10 years, and we're in our ninth season," he said. "I don't think anything was done improperly; we've just had a lot of bodies through the pool."