CAÑON CITY — Of the 66 Colorado towns and cities with more than 7,000 residents, only one doesn’t have a swimming pool within 3 miles.
That would be Cañon City.
Heather Darrow, the resident who dug up that statistic through hours of her own research, said she went in search of information that she could share with the community as it debated whether to build a new pool to replace one that shut down two years ago after 56 summers of operation.
“I wanted to know, are we the only community without a pool?” she said. “How many pools are there? There’s not many that don’t have a pool.”
Home from work on maternity leave, she found census data that listed Colorado cities by population, created a spreadsheet and then looked up which ones had pools because there wasn’t a readily available list of such things. She called places such as Limon and Sterling and Alamosa to talk to local officials about their pools.
She found that Cañon City has 3,649 kids under the age of 18, or about 21% of the city’s 17,241 residents, according to census data. There are communities such as Parachute, she said, that have fewer than 3,600 residents of all ages that have a pool.
The 115-square-mile recreation district that includes the city and surrounding populations in a portion of Fremont County serves even more people: about 28,000, said Kyle Horne, executive director the Cañon City Area Recreation and Park District.
Darrow shared her research with the nonprofit Citizens for a Pool group, the Every Town Needs a Pool campaign committee and the recreation district, and it quickly became a talking point. It bolstered the community-driven effort the rec district took with its surveys, informational meetings, short videos and a website that explains every step taken before officials decided on a proposal to take to voters.
Darrow hopes it strengthens the arguments for approving the three November ballot questions that would bring a new pool to Cañon City and provide funding to keep it running.
A pool where her two children and all the others in town could take swim lessons and enjoy recreation.
“I couldn’t imagine them growing up without a pool,” she said, noting that along with a newborn daughter she has a 7-year-old son. “He’s missed not being able to go to a pool the last two summers.”
A struggle to keep a pool open
The southern Colorado town had an outdoor pool near the high school and a community park for 56 summers, and before that there was a large privately run mineral springs-fed pool called the Carlsbad Natatorium northeast of downtown.
St. Thomas More Hospital has a small therapy pool that is being repaired and is expected to reopen in November for patients, a CommonSpirit spokeswoman said in an email. The hospital also plans to have limited public use in 2025 for water aerobics and exercise. The pool holds 10 people.
But for two summers the rec district community of nearly 30,000 people has been without a public pool. No swim lessons. No swim club. No cooling off on days approaching 100 degrees. People could drive about 10 miles to Florence and hope to gain entry to one of two daily sessions at the already-busy pool there, or 50 miles or so to Pueblo or Colorado Springs.
The recreation district created in 1965 to open and operate the R.C. Icabone Pool tried to head off the loss of its pool, and indeed care and maintenance doubled the pool’s life expectancy of 25 to 30 years.
The district went to voters four times, beginning in 1989, seeking money for repairs or replacement and were soundly defeated each time. It was criticized for adding a rec center or other park improvements with each of the ballot questions. Of asking for too much.
In the spring of 2023, with no money for capital improvements, the torn liners, cracks and failing systems were too much to overcome and the Icabone pool was permanently closed.
There was no time that year, city and rec district officials said, to get something on the ballot. Nobody wanted to hurry because they wanted plenty of time for community meetings and surveys after four defeated measures.
This fall, voters will be asked again to help pay for a new pool, this one with a $24.8 million price tag. There are differences: it would be simply an aquatics center, but it would include a year-round lap pool as well as seasonal amenities; the construction bonds would be paid through a city sales tax that will sunset when the bonds are paid off; and four government entities are partnering in the effort.
The rec district would oversee construction and operation of the pool; the city would collect the sales tax and pass it through to the rec district and has agreed to close a portion of 12th Street to accommodate an adjacent parking lot. The Cañon City School District is donating a piece of land in front of the high school for the parking lot, and Fremont County commissioners recently voted to kick in $100,000 from its American Rescue Plan Act funds for the project if voters approve it.
“It really is a collaborative project,” Cañon City manager Ryan Stevens said. “The rec district has been a great partner. This has been community led. That’s why we go through the feasibility studies — to dial in to what most people want. We found out a year-round asset for swimming and aquatics is really important to people.”
Community surveys show widespread support for a pool, but there is hesitancy on how much people are willing to pay, especially when it comes to property taxes.
“They’ve got a steep hill on this one,” said Adam Hartman, superintendent of Cañon City Schools. “It’s hard to believe a town with almost 20,000 doesn’t have a pool. We are doing what we can to support them.”
The positives are numerous: providing swim lessons to children in a community where the Arkansas River runs through its heart; the ability to add high school swim teams; physical education classes for various ages; year-round recreational swimming for all ages; water aerobics and exercise for seniors; and a home for the Piranhas competitive swim club that practiced and competed in the Icabone pool for more than 50 years.
But is it enough to get voters to approve a 0.3% city sales tax and a 4-mill increase to property taxes? The sales tax of 30 cents on every $100 spent would pay back the construction bond, and the mill levy — about $80 a year more on property taxes on a $300,000 home — would go into the rec district operating budget.
Those behind the effort know that it will be a tough campaign, but they remain cautiously optimistic that they chose the right plan.
“A year-round pool will give us options we’ve never had in this community,” Horne said. “It improves recreational offerings. … We can have swim teams — girls in the winter and boys in spring. We can have learn-to-swim programs for adults, a need that is growing.”
While indoor pools cost more to build than outdoor pools, Horne noted that the return on the investment is much greater for the indoor/outdoor option. Indoor pools last twice as long as outdoor pools because they are not exposed to the elements, use more than triples from about 100 days a year to a full year, and a greater cross-section of the community could make use of the facility.
Since it was created in 1965 to operate the now-closed swimming pool, the rec district has not had a mill levy increase. Horne said it is the second-lowest funded district in the state, at $39.78 per capita. One of the closest demographically is in Montrose, where per capita funding is $109.90.
“The truth is, people want to have recreation,” he said. “If you want to recreate 365 days a year you have to fund it.
“The economic benefits are huge — businesses are looking to see if this community is willing to invest in itself,” he continued. “They want amenities for employees and families — it (the pool) is a piece of the puzzle. We are now missing that big piece of the puzzle.”
Not money makers
Community pools don’t make money. They rely on a variety of funding sources, including taxes, donations and grants. They are usually built with tax money, although occasionally a benefactor steps in.
That was the case in tiny Parachute in western Colorado, where ExxonMobil built the Grand Valley Recreation Center in its Battlement Mesa development during the 1980s oil boom, aquatics manager Michelle Andrews said.
When the oil boom slowed, the development was sold to the Battlement Mesa Development Company and in 2016 the rec center became part of the Parachute/Battlement Mesa Recreation District. It still gets 70% of its funding from gas and oil royalties, Andrews said. Other funding comes from property taxes and grants.
“It’s important for the community,” Andrews said. “We offer swim lessons year-round and they’re always full. We have water aerobics and we do Silver Sneakers on Wednesdays for the seniors.”
The rec center serves about 20,000 people, including residents of Battlement Mesa, Parachute and De Beque.
Still, financial records for the district show inconsistent and generally declining revenue from gas and oil. Voters rejected a request in 2020 for a property tax increase to bolster the recreation district.
“The district runs a large deficit with expenditures and wages far exceeding charges for services, fees and memberships,” the recreation district said in its 2024 budget report. The report noted that the district expects to seek another mill levy increase in the future to maintain its recreational offerings.
In Carbondale, community leaders are in the midst of raising funds to help offset increased construction costs for a replacement pool that was approved by voters in 2022. As in Cañon City, its pool could no longer be repaired. It is being demolished to make way for one slated to open in 2026.
The new pool is expected to be the state’s first “all electric” pool with on-site solar panels and heat pumps to heat and cool the bathhouse and water. To help with that, it secured a $348,000 grant from the Colorado Energy Office.
Horne said the Cañon City Area Park and Recreation District will consider all energy options for the Cañon City pool, including solar.
He said the district is “actively looking at grant options,” but those would come only if voters approve a new pool. He also noted that the feasibility study and survey work that led to the decision to ask voters to approve a new pool were paid for by the rec district, city of Cañon City, Royal Gorge Route Railroad, Royal Gorge Bridge and Park, Newmont Mine Legacy Fund, Recreation Enhances our Community, and El Pomar Foundation.
Campaigning underway
The Citizens for a Pool group formed soon after the Icabone pool closed in May 2023, said Randi McMinn-Esquibel. It took six months to get nonprofit status so it could raise money for the pool. But its members started talking about the importance of a pool for the community.
Safety. Accessible recreation. Water therapy. Infrastructure to meet a growing city’s needs. Swim teams.
The list goes on.
“People think I work for the rec district,” she said with a laugh. “I live here, I graduated from Florence High School. My parents and in-laws live here. I just truly believe in this and believe in our town.”
Safety is a big issue for her and others supporting the pool effort, and they want swim lessons to be accessible for all kids — and adults.
“We have a river that runs right through us,” she said, noting that the Arkansas River is not the best place to learn to swim.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says drowning is the No. 1 cause of death for children ages 1-4, and accessible swimming lessons reduces the risk by 88%. The National Drowning Prevention Alliance is a strong backer of community pools.
Once the Icabone pool closed some parents drove an hour to Pueblo or Colorado Springs to get their kids to swim lessons, but that’s not feasible for most. And the small pool in nearby Florence was at capacity most days with its own children.
Florence City Manager Amy Nasta said the pool started having two public swim sessions daily in summer 2020, with a capacity of 125 people in each session. They have been almost always full since 2020, she said.
“I took carloads of kiddos to Florence, and we would have to wait to get into the second session,” said McMinn-Esquibel, who also noticed more kids in the Arkansas River and a shortage of the personal flotation devices available for free along the river.
Citizens for a Pool’s sister organization, Every Town Needs a Pool, is heading up campaign efforts. Campaign yard signs will soon be sprouting in supporter’s yards and a fundraising kickoff party is set for Friday.