Disappointing news was revealed in today’s budget deliberations, as a long promised pool for the East End of Moncton is being delayed by another year.
Director of Recreation and Leisure Jocelyn Cohoon says some issues have arisen, including concerns over the stability of the soil.
“The soil conditions are such that if you put a heavy pool on unstable soil it has the potential to move around so we need to have that soil stabilized or have a treatment to stabilize the pool when you build it,” says Cohoon.
The cost of the new East End Pool was originally pegged at $1 million, however, the most recent estimate shows the price has skyrocketed to $2.1 million.
City of Moncton Ward 1 Councillor Shawn Crossman is disappointed in the delay.
He says it is sad that kids from the East End had to picket and rally in front of City Hall to remind Council and Staff of their promise of a new pool.
“Those costs, to my assumption, should have been all taken care of, there shouldn’t be any reason to the increase in the budget, number one, number two, that pool has been in that spot since 1977, if that earth is moving some 30 years later, we have an issue,” fumes Crossman.
He says there’s been nothing done since the original motion by Council supporting a new pool in 2013, and two years later a report was completed.
“This report comes out showing us exactly what it’s going to cost, here we are in 2017, we don’t know what it’s going to cost, it could cost more, all of a sudden the soil is unsecure,” says Crossman. “That should have all been taken care of right after Council moved the original motion.”
He says City Manager Marc Landry admitted staff have not reached out to provincial and federal partners for funding help.
“To me, that is sad, because I have Minister Cathy Rogers calling me, I have her office calling me, I have [Moncton-Riverview-Dieppe MP] Ginette Petitpas Taylor’s office interested in this,” says Crossman. “To hear that City staff have not reached out to the correct authorities to help increase that budget is really disappointing.”
Crossman has already received numerous messages from his constituents upset over the delay considering other projects begun later than the East End Pool are likely to be completed before the promised pool.
He is not giving up on this project, and says he’ll be pushing for this pool to be completed next year as promised instead of having to wait until 2019.