Officials announced that construction of a new Aquatics Center at Charter Oak High School is scheduled to commence before the end of this December.
The new aquatics center will be completely new construction, not a renovation and will feature a larger pool at 31 by 25 meters. Bidding for construction has yet to take place, but estimates put the cost at over $3 million, school officials said.
In October of 2012, architects from NTD Architecture presented their initial design and cost estimates to the Charter Oak Unified Board of Education.
This September, the plans for the new aquatics center were approved by the Division of State Architect.
The pools are used for swim meets for the boys and girls water polo games.
The current pools, which are about 50 years old, are in disrepair, sporting large cracks and missing tiles. The diving pool does not meet CIF regulations, coaches said.
The water polo pool does not meet the minimum dimension requirements established by the Nation Federation of High School Associations. Pools must be 25 meters long and a maximum of 20 meters to a minimum of 13 meters wide.
Charter Oak’s is 18 meters long by 9 meters wide, coaches said.
The aquatics teams and parent groups have voiced their concerns about the conditions of the current pools and have initiated attempts to generate funding for repairs in years past.
The governing board considered a new aquatics center among their list of priorities in the district's new Facilities Master Plan.
District officials will spend November reviewing potential contractors for the aquatics center. A contractor will be selected and a contract will be signed some time this December, said Kathy Perkins, chief business officer for Charter Oak.
