City Council meeting that could spell fate of the City Pool

A special meeting is scheduled in regards to the City Pool on Tuesday, August 8 at the City Hall gymnasium in Malta at 7:00 p.m. Three of five mayoral candidates were in attendance, earning a nod from current Mayor Shyla Jones.

"I want to welcome all the candidates here," she said. "I think it's great that you guys are coming (to the city council meetings) because we are about to set budgets. The budgets will be decided this year for next year."

Though they did not set the budget that night, Mayor Jones reminded the candidates that this year's budget meeting, set on Thursday, July 27 at 5 p.m. will affect the winner of this year's election.

"And I am also excited for December 31 to get here," Mayor Jones said.

The pool was one of the main topics of discussion at last Tuesday's City Council Meeting, along with the City okaying a bond loan of $440,000 to excavate and prepare land at the City Landfill, opening up a new cell for solid waste.

The project's estimated cost was $395,000 but the bid went to Bishop Inc. for $199,500 with an addition $65,000 in engineering costs. The city okayed a loan up to $440,000 due to the possible unforeseen costs of the project.

Lynda Brown, of the Hi-Line Future Foundation (HFF), read a letter from the group, expressing concerns over potentially losing the City Pool. The HFF reminded the Council that the fundraising for the City Pool had been successful last fall and also shared plans for future fundraising projects which includes Oktoberfest and the raffling of a quarter beef and a vacation.

"We never felt we had decision making authorities, as far as pool designs or plans and we remain steadfast in our goal to raise funds to keep a city pool in our community, whether it be new or refurbished," Brown read from an HFF letter.

The letter sparked a calm discussion in which the Council discussed the state of the pool, the possible costs of refurbishing the pool to whether it would even be viable to fix the pool given the repairs may not last the length of a possible ten year loan.

The mayor has not given up on the pool, mentioning that there will be companies looking into the project.

"We are contacting a couple of pool companies to come and look into a pool refurbish and expand type of thing,"Mayor Jones said.

Another possible issue the pool faces to stay open is being able to satisfy the requirements of a new and unnamed State pool inspector, who shut down the pool earlier that day due to the condition of the water. One day prior to inspection an electrical storm had affected the pump, causing circulation to stop.

"We had a clarity issue as well," Mayor Jones said. "Nothing as bad as we have had, especially last year. You could still see the lines in the deep end."

The City Pool will also now be required to send their daily tests to the inspector and if the condition of the pool falls below a two on their scale, the pool will have to close for that day.

One way to solve the issue of circulation is by doubling up on the pumps.

"They want a second circulation system in that pool," Mayor Jones said. "They said one is not enough. If we have to do that then that's not even feasible."

The August 8 meeting will bring more clarity to the issues the pool is facing to even stay open and all of the public is invited.

The council also voted to approve the 2017/18 wages for employees and elected officials, which gave raises to select city employees up to 4 percent.

The Malta Chamber of Commerce represented by Dina Meneely and PhillCo represented by Ashley Stuart tag teamed to present the board with the idea of a brand for Phillips County.

"We want not only you, but our residents, business owners in Malta and (all of) Phillips County to look at this and kind of get a feel and think about what is the story of Phillips County," Stuart said to the board during their presentation."

Two council members agreed to attend meetings with the Chamber and PhillCo as potential members of the project's board.

Earlier in the meeting Parks and Recreation Co-Director Julia Tatafu mentioned that the Co-Ed Softball league had doubled it's amount of teams from five last season to ten this year. Tatafu mentioned the gopher problem at the softball fields but the council revealed that the gopher issue cannot be addressed until the spring months.

Tatafu also mentioned that the Kids Soccer League is scheduled to start on Saturday, August 12.