PORT ANGELES — The William Shore Memorial Pool District has been chosen to receive two grants from the state Recreation and Conservation Office and the Department of Commerce, totaling $1.25 million.
The two grants will support the $14 million expansion and renovation of the 57-year-old William Shore Pool in Port Angeles.
The district, with collaboration from the city of Port Angeles, put together an application for a $750,000 grant to the state Department of Commerce Community Development Block Grant (CDBG).
The grant funds will be used to create space for the district’s after-school program, SPARK Squad. As of the start of the school year, more than 60 kids attend this program every weekday.
“[The grant] is absolutely critical to be able to build the space for our after-school care program,” said Steve Burke, pool director. “It’s also critical for helping fund the exercise pool as well.”
The William Shore Memorial District also applied for and won a $500,000 grant from the Recreation Conservation Office’s Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) program to be used for the construction of a warm water exercise pool.
The combined $1.25 million is in addition to $1.5 million the pool received from the state earlier this year and $50,000 from the county’s Opportunity Fund.
He said had the two grants not come through, the pool would have needed to scale back its expansion.
Burke said the pool is working with local state lawmakers with hopes of securing another $1.5 million from the state as well.
Construction is expected to start April 1 and design is about 60 percent complete, he said.
Burke said he anticipates releasing a rendering of the new facility in the coming weeks.
The William Shore Memorial Pool is the first RCO-funded project to qualify under the never-been-used-before exception allowing an indoor project based on the June mean temperature in Port Angeles averaging below 72 degrees.
The district’s application scored second highest out of 25 applications submitted statewide for the LWCF program.
“What made our grant applications very competitive was our valuable community support of the project,” Burke said.
Voters approved of the project by more than 70 percent in November 2017, allowing for local match money provided by the voters as well as the Clallam County Opportunity Fund.
The debt load increase, which expanded the district’s debt capacity by $3.5 million up to $10 million, gave the green light to a long-planned, 10,000-square-foot expansion and remodeling of the pool at 225 E. Fifth St.
“We will be maximizing and efficiently investing these funds for a first-rate aquatic facility to be enjoyed for future decades,” he said.
“This modernization and expansion of the pool is a vital and significant project for our community,” said Bill Peach, president of the William Shore Memorial District’s Board of Commissioners said in a statement. “When we as a community vote to support an important project, that support helps.”
Built in 1961, the pool is in need of about $2 million in repairs and the 15,000-square-foot facility has become overcrowded with more than 100,000 annual visits.
The city of Port Angeles operated the pool since it opened in 1962 and planned to close it in 2008 because of the cost of renovations.
Property owners within the district, which shares a boundary with the Port Angeles School District, will pay an additional 6 cents per $1,000 of assessed valuation to help fund the $12 million expansion.
The rest of the expansion will be covered by bonds from existing levy capacity and state grants.
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Reporter Jesse Major can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 56250, or at jmajor@peninsuladailynews.com.
