City pool redesign underway

Clarendon’s proposed water recreation facility is already being redesigned as city leaders get ready to bid the project a third time, according to information presented at last Thursday’s city council meeting.

Mayor Sandy Skelton said he and City Administrator David Dockery had a frank conversation with facility engineer Waters Edge Aquatic Design about the money available for the project, the time lost, and the unaffordability of the original design.

Designer Dave Swartz agreed with Skelton’s points and also agreed to redesign the facility at no charge to the city.

The new design is based on the city’s base budget of $1.86 million and on the bids that have come in twice now at levels that have surprised Swartz as well as the city.

“They are used to bids of around $500 per square foot of water surface, but our bids came in around $680 per square foot,” Skelton said.

The high bids have again been blamed on skyrocketing steel and concrete costs, Skelton said.

The new design will be a smaller rectangular design that will be cheaper to construct that the more complicated curved pool originally designed, the mayor said. Cost savings will also come from housing the bathhouse, concessions, and pump equipment in one building instead of two and from reducing the depth of the pool at the diving board by having a half-meter high diving board instead of a full meter. Other cost savings are also possible as the redesign moves forward.

The new design of the pool will have to get a new approval to meet the Americans with Disabilities Act and get the okay of the Texas Parks & Wildlife Department before it can go to bid.

Skelton said that Swartz still believes the project can be opened for the 2020 summer season but Skelton and Dockery think 2021 is probably more realistic.

In other city business, aldermen appointed Bunni Owens and Wilma Lindley as the judge and alternate judge for the upcoming city election this May and approved a donation of $1,000 to the Donley County Senior Citizens program.

The council also considered and approved the creation of sub-supervisory positions in the water, street, and sanitation departments to begin a succession plan for future leadership of those areas of the city. The plan created a foreman position in each department to work under the current supervisor to begin learning more about the department and to take charge in the supervisors’ absence.

Public Works Director John Molder and Sanitation Director Joe Neal Shadle spoke in favor of the plan.

“I thought I was prepared when (former city superintendent) Jim Roberts died,” Molder said, “but, boy, was I wrong. It takes years to learn all this”

Under the plan, Brad Hagood, Raul Mendoza, and Danny Gaines will become foremen in the water, street, and sanitation departments respectively. Each man will receive a $2 per hour increase in salary and be expected to finish additional trainings, licensing, or certifications.

In his administrator’s report, Dockery reported that the city had received an award for collecting 93 tons of recycling last year and said the sanitation department and the citizens of Clarendon are to be commended for those efforts.