Palatine parks board approves Harper College pool plan
Palatine Park District commissioners voted Tuesday to approve their $9 million portion of a $38 million plan with Harper College that will bring indoor pool access to district residents when the work is completed in two years.
The plan will renovate the college's on-campus Recreation and Wellness Center and allow the park district to be the primary operator of the building's pool.
Park district commissioner Jay Cozza said the building is old and decrepit now but will essentially become a modern recreation center on the south side of town.
Palatine Park District Executive Director Mike Clark said it would have cost the district around $15 million to build a new indoor pool facility on its own.
“And to have a partner with a potentially bigger customer base,” Clark said, referring to the nearly 500,000 people that live within Harper College's district boundaries, “as well as the infrastructure that's already there with the parking ... it made it very attractive to have a partner on this.”
The commissioners approved the plan with a 3-1 vote. Park board President Terry Ruff voted against it.
“I have some concerns about it being located so far in the southwest corner of the village,” Ruff said after the meeting. “I love the project, though. We wouldn't be able to build a pool for $9 million anywhere else.”
Clark said the idea to partner with Harper started in 2013 at an intergovernmental dinner where he first met Harper President Ken Ender. Clark said that in their first conversation about the pool at the college's recreation center, Ender indicated that they were leaning toward doing away with the aging, increasingly unpopular facility.
“Once I shared with him how much the Palatine community used (the pool), he saw its importance as a community asset,” Clark said after the meeting.
Harper trustees voted 6-1 in favor of the plan last Wednesday. Now that both sides are on board, the district will devise an operations plan.
Park district commissioner Sue Gould said she is excited to offer year-round swimming lessons.
“So many people don't know how to swim because their communities don't have pools,” Gould said. “We don't have time in just two and a half months to schedule lessons for every kid in an outdoor pool. Now we will have that time.”
Under the agreement, Palatine Park District residents can also access the rest of the facility. Clark said in a recent survey residents said their top three most desired facilities were indoor aquatics, a fitness center and group exercise — and now they can get all three at the same place.
The renovated building also would include a 5,000- to 10,000-square-foot Northwest Community Healthcare clinic as a tenant. Work on the renovation is expected to begin in March 2017 and finish in August 2018.