Letter: the Rossland Pool

Dear Mayor and Council,

The recent report in the Trail Times has created a lot of concern in the community – https://www.trailtimes.ca/home/committee-recommends-rossland-pool-be-phased-out-7484322 . There is also an extensive history not covered in that press report. Suffice to say, any recreation facility requires a heavy subsidy. The curling club stand as another example, with just a few dozen people using it. In comparison, the Rossland Recreation Master Plan (2022) on page 24 shows over 6000 visits to the Rossland pool in 2022.

Meanwhile, it’s not sensible at all to get drawn back into the Trail Regional Recreation system due to the opacity of the accounting, the high user fees proposed by Trail, the lack of visitor counts (by Trail) of Rossland users, etc.,  and the absence of any capital planning in both Warfield and Trail, each of which also have ageing infrastructure and under-funded capital deficits, issues which the Trail Times missed. Yet the Trail Times piece suggests that either would be the place for Rosslanders to use a pool. It’s a very bad idea to do that, for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is the inconvenience to parents of younger children who need a life skill and the removal of a walkable destination point to learn that life skill. Rossland is supposed to be a full-service community, with walking distance amenities.

Rossland would not be such an easy target for the Trail Times, which cites high taxes here, if there were a balancing context showing those two neighbouring municipalities’ infrastructure deficits. Though the Committee’s report is not yet available (easily at least), it is unfair to portray the pool expenses of $77,000 as exorbitant, and without showing the revenues, perhaps 30% – 40% of costs. Yes, it also needs a band-aid every few years and it is old. But so what. Rossland’s water system shows a $35 million+ deficit  and yet there is no Development Cost Charges bylaw after 12 years of four successive Councils’ forfeiture of much needed capital revenues. There’s a really important focus point.

There’s also not a lot of good faith in the two out-of-town alternatives suggested. In an earlier discussion on a regional recreation deal, Trail’s councillors once stated to Rossland’s councillors, “Your hypothetical contribution to the regional recreation will be placed in Trail’s general revenue fund and will support planting flowers in the gulch.”

Rather than looking to chop the pool, perhaps Council can confirm whether the operations crews still plough 33 private driveways, including Feeney Road outside the municipality. It’s not even a legal road, btw. A previous Council restored that free rogue servicing in 2016, so with the budgetary concerns noted here it would make sense to ensure that these operational expenses (running into the hundreds of thousands annually) are hopefully not continuing.

Meanwhile, Rossland’s Council may wish to clarify the Trail Times reporting points and the Committee’s recommendations within a broader context. In short, given the 2022 Recreation Master Plan and the bad history of the Trail regional recreation system, it does not make a lot of sense to close or phase out the Rossland pool.

Regards,

Mike