Some local pools to open soon
May 28—While some swimming pools in southern West Virginia will be sufficiently staffed with lifeguards to safely open for the season over Memorial Day weekend, others are in a holding pattern or have delayed their starts as managers and administrators look for additional staff.
Beckley city officials are planning for both of its pools to be open Friday, June 3, delayed from its original opening target date of Memorial Day — Monday.
The city, facing a lack of lifeguards, contracted this spring with USA Pools/USA Management for $130,000 to manage, staff and operate both New River Park and Historic Black Knight swimming facilities from May 28 to Sept. 5.
USA Pools is a national company that supplies lifeguards and manages pools around the country.
USA Pools ran into some delays of its own in Beckley, but told city officials in a Thursday night meeting that final training and testing of lifeguards would be handled this coming week.
Parks and Recreation Director Leslie Baker said the city has been assured that USA Pools will meet its new schedule and she "feels confident" that the pools will be open on Friday.
"We have every confidence in them," Baker said.
The last time New River Pool was fully operational was in 2016.
Baker said there will be four lifeguards at Black Knight and eight at New River. The pools will be open Tuesdays through Sundays from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. The pools will be closed on Mondays.
Baker has other concerns, too. She reiterated on Friday, as she told The Register-Herald earlier this year, that the concession stands may not open — again, because of a lack of workers. While she has hired enough ticket takers for both pools, she is coming up short on manning concessions.
The city wants to offer cold drinks, nachos, hot dogs, chips, ice cream, candy bars and other poolside favorites, which aids in drawing swimmers to the pools.
Baker is looking for workers ages 18 and older to work concessions.
Regardless of the outcome, City Treasurer Billie Trump said the city has done everything in its power to try to get its two pools open this year.
"We've done word-of-mouth recruiting. We've been to the schools asking the various schools that have swim teams, 'Would you like to take the lifeguard training?' We've set up lifeguard classes. We've subsidized people. If you take the lifeguard classes, we'll pay the fees, which are about $300," he said. "We've gone to the college. We put ads on Indeed. We've used any of the other online hiring services. We've advertised, not only in the paper, but online and on Facebook and everywhere."
Having exhausted all options, Trump said it is frustrating that most in the city still don't understand how difficult a task finding lifeguards has been in the last few years.
"We beat the bushes trying to get people to come out and become lifeguards, and it's really frustrating because people had the perception that it's really easy to fill those staff positions. But it's not," he said.
Trump added this issue is not unique to Beckley and is being faced by community pools across the nation.
"There are a lot of cities that have — even the larger cities that have a number of pools, are either operating them at significantly reduced hours or closing several and operating a fraction of their pools," he said. "This is a problem that's ongoing everywhere. Finding people who work, especially people that have these specific skills and training is very, very difficult."
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In Fayette County, where hourly rates for lifeguards were recently raised to $11 an hour, County Park Director Wayne Workman said he has a full staff of eight lifeguards squared away for the season. Opening day for the Fayette County Park pool will be 11 a.m. on Wednesday, June 1.
While the pay is higher than most pools in the area, Workman said it's not the reason they were able to attract lifeguards.
"That hasn't really been discussed with any of them yet, the pay," he said. "They just actually came out on their own. We never negotiated pay or anything with any of the ones that applied, but we will be doing that."
The community pool in White Sulphur Springs is also fully staffed for the season and is preparing to open for its second straight season after taking a more than five-year hiatus due to needed repairs.
Although they barely had any lifeguard applicants just over a month ago, Linda Coleman, the financial secretary with the city of White Sulphur Springs, said they have since been able to hire eight lifeguards and are on track to open for their first day at 11 a.m. on Saturday, May 28.
Debbie McCall, manager of the Western Greenbrier Swimming Pool also known as the Rainelle Public Swimming Pool, said she has not been as fortunate, but she does have high hopes for the rest of the season.
McCall said she currently has four lifeguards but is hoping more will apply soon as she's been made aware that a nearby lifeguard certification class should wrap up on June 7 and is fully booked with prospective lifeguards.
With her current limited staff, McCall said the Rainelle pool will just be open Monday for Memorial Day and then again from 1 to 6 p.m. June 4-5.
Following that weekend, McCall said, "we will see how many guards we have and go from there."
