High school’s pool is filled with red ink

Coronado High School’s pool is on the verge of bankruptcy 20 months after it opened. It’s losing money so fast – about $25,000 a month – that Coronado’s schools superintendent proposed shutting it down last week. The red ink endangers the centerpiece of a revered aquatics program that is as much a signature of Coronado High as its sky-high test scores and renowned school of performing arts. The 52-meter pool hosts the community’s champion water polo teams that are a leading source of civic pride. Four Coronado High alumni play on the U.S. men’s national water polo team, and two made the Olympic team last year. The Coronado school board, in whose hands the pool’s fate rests, listened to parents testify last week that the pool is a vital educational asset in a community mostly surrounded by water. The trustees heard anecdotes about Coronado children saving lives after learning how to swim in physical education classes at the pool. And they looked adoringly down upon the lowered lectern where an ambassador from the future, 8-year-old Quin Casey, delivered his plea: “If the pool closes down, I won’t be able to play. I think it would be great to keep it open for a lot of new water polo players.” It was this kind of community devotion to water sports that raised a $1.2 million endowment to help operate and maintain the pool, officially known as the Brian Bent Memorial Aquatics Complex. But expenses have drained more than $500,000 from the endowment and raised worries that it could disappear altogether if nothing is done. Even closing the pool will cost the school district $258 a day to run the pumps and add the chemicals to keep the pool from becoming an algae-filled public nuisance. Only plowing it under could put a stop to the costs that board President Doug Metz called “feeding the beast.” Read the entire Union Tribune article here.