City budget funding allotted to St. Boniface outdoor pool project first step in lengthy process, councillor says

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This article was published 12/12/2024 (659 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

There’s $3 million in the city’s proposed budget to kick-start the creation of a new aquatic centre in St. Boniface, but there are concerns about the project’s eventual price tag and open timeline.

While the preliminary budget released Wednesday includes $3.1 million over six years allotted to consultation, preliminary design and other early steps toward building an outdoor pool, the suggested construction plan is anticipated to cost more than $10 million.

Area city councillor Matt Allard said the announcement is the first step in a years-long process to determine operating costs and lobby for the funds needed to complete the pool.

“It’s a green light to say, ‘Go and see what you can do,’” he said Thursday.

“We all know it’s not enough to get built, but it is enough to get things going.”

The proposed project comes after budget concerns led to the controversial closure of Happyland pool earlier this year, which the city attributed to low attendance and high costs for repairs.

A public survey on a possible new aquatic facility in St. Boniface closed last week. Allard said a report on next steps is coming next month.

It’s too early to say when the funding may be secured and construction could begin, but Allard pointed to two other completed capital projects with a similar cost — the renovations at Bonivital Pool and the Tache Promenade — as examples of long-term goals that were completed under his leadership.

“An outdoor aquatic facility in St. Boniface is, to me, existential,” he said. “I want to leave St Boniface better than it was when I when I was elected in 2014 and, with that in mind, I want and I believe that I will deliver an outdoor aquatic facility to the residents of St.Boniface ward.”

South St. Boniface Residents Association president Teresa Cwik is less optimistic.

“I’m skeptical that this pool will even happen, because they just don’t have the money,” she said.

Cwik has long advocated for funding being allocated to fix existing pools that are deteriorating over building new.

She said people living near some potential locations don’t want a facility built near them, expecting increased traffic from outside St. Boniface. As well, she said a city council comparison to the Transcona Aquatic Park, which charges city standard outdoor pool season admission rates for entry, leaves her association concerned it will lock out low-income community members.

She also wonders why Happyland pool — which closed even after community members raised thousands of dollars in hopes of keeping it open for another season — couldn’t have been funded through the years it would take to build the new facility.

“For the money (the aquatic facility would take… we could have Happyland open, then in another year, or couple years, we could fix up another pool and keep that one open, and so forth, and the city wouldn’t have to worry about trying to come up with $10 million or whatever it costs to make one of these.”

Allard, who was originally against the closure of the pools in his ward, said he remained sympathetic to constituents who advocated for repairs, but, “given that this door is open, this is the door that (he’s) walking through.”

The city has whittled down the list of potential sites to the Norwood West Community Centre, the Water Tower District and Provencher Park.

The $3.1 million in preliminary funding is being pulled from ward reserve funds, including two years of funding from the Community Incentive Grant Program. About half — $1.4 million — is to be reallocated from a previously-proposed Winakwa Community Centre spray pad, which has since been deferred.

Mayor Scott Gillingham pointed to MLAs and Members of Parliament as resources Allard could possibly seek further funding from.

“This is not uncommon for councilors to do this,” he said. “They use their own funds, as it were, to make an investment to improve their wards, but they’ll leverage those funds to get access to and partners at other levels of government.”

— With files from Joyanne Pursaga

malak.abas@freepress.mb.ca