If we decide to keep the pool open and accessible to the public even for specific hours, we are also opening and exposing our students at risk. Three of these reasons are health, maintenance, and security.
Someone who has a couple dollars, enough to pay at the entrance, can easily intoxicate or spread a possible skin disease in the pool or lockerooms. Given that pools are being filtered, there is no guarantee that a contagious skin disease cannot be spread. There is always that .01% of possibility that this can happen. It can be as fungal infection, rashes, or something that is more serious and concerning.
With the upcoming season of summer where a cool and nice dip in the pool is a must for most, the hot weather makes the spread of fungus faster. If this happens, there will be adults and children who might suffer from specific skin diseases. Parents love their kids and they get aggressive when they see that their child is in pain, and thus, a complaint against Pierce will be made and this will be another liability that the administration is going to face.
Maintaining the cleanliness of the pool during and after the hours that it is open to the public can be demanding and costly. The pool might be filtered, however, we cannot ensure that this will work and filter all possible dirt and bacteria from the outside and other users of the pool. We have to make sure that our swimming pool is clean especially for the students who are using the pool everyday whether for class or training for purposes.
Outsiders or civilians who are or will be patronizing the public pool are required to pay a specific amount to have access to our pool. According to the website of Pierce College Extension, the pool is open to the public during weekends. For those who are 17 years old and younger, they have to pay a dollar, while for those who are 18 years old and over, they will pay $2.00. This very little amount that they have to pay doesn’t guarantee that the sum of the amount of the profits that we will make from having the open hours will be enough to fund the maintenance and other expenses needed to keep and improve the pool.
Lastly, public pool hours mean less privacy for the students, faculty, and staff. This is true not just for the students who use the pool, but also for every student on campus. This school is already big enough for every student to know and recognize each other. This means that for each incident, the radius becomes bigger and witnesses might have hard time identifying someone who is involved in an incident.
Our campus is a big place and a lot of crazy incidents happen here. An example would be what happened last semester at the ladies’ locker room where a woman, who was taking shower after her swimming class, reported that she found a man peeping her take a shower. Luckily she screamed and her friend called the sheriff’s department immediately.
Incidents like this are what we are trying to avoid at school by not having pool public hours. A small profit is not worth the safety of our students.