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Volunteers Lexus Buzan, left, and Maurice Ochoa are amazed at the size of the San Manuel Pool. It looks so much bigger when empty.
For all you swimmers and sun worshippers out there: the date draws nigh.
The San Manuel Pool will be opening SOON!
Repairs have been made and volunteers are using their time to repaint EVERYTHING that can be painted including the bottom of the pool. As soon as the painting is done and the repairs have been tested, it will be time to fill the pool.
And we at the San Manuel Miner want to know: How many gallons will it take to fill the pool? We’re even going to make a contest of it. The person who guesses the closest to the amount it actually takes to fill the San Manuel Pool will win a season pass to the pool, courtesy of Mammoth-San Manuel Community Schools.
There are a couple ways to win.
Visit our Facebook page (located at facebook.com/copperarea) and send us a PM with your guess.
You can email your guess to editor@minersunbasin.com.
Or you can drop off your entry through the slot in the Miner office door.
Only one entry per person. Be sure to include your name, address and phone number.
The winner will be announced at the grand reopening of the pool, tentatively set for June 15.
To celebrate, the pool’s opening, there will be free swimming for all and free hot dogs for the kids.
So what was wrong with the pool? Community Schools Director Lisa Armenta told the Miner that when the pool was built 50 years ago, it was built with a seam. It was this seam that was leaking.
“There is no sinkhole,” Lisa said, explaining that when the pool was built, a large amount of rock was used to line the hole which prevents a sinkhole from forming.
The district, Lisa said, “had the hardest time getting someone out here to just diagnose the pool.” Dave Hogan, she said, sent requests for bids to companies statewide before one company in Glendale agreed to come look at the pool. Lisa said the owner believed that the kids in the Tri-Community should have a pool. San Manuel, Lisa explained, was way out of his service area.
The last time the pool was drained, she said, was 19 years ago.
And now that the pool is empty, the maintenance crew at Mammoth-San Manuel Schools is taking the opportunity to replace everything that can be replaced in the pool: lights, drains, etc. Painting is being done by volunteers. (And if you’d like to help paint the pool, the school would welcome you; just email Lisa ArmentL@msmusd.org or call her at 385-2337 ext. 1110.)
The pool will be offering swimming lessons again this year starting Tuesday, June 21, at 9 a.m. The lessons are FREE thanks to a grant from SaddleBrooke Community Outreach. Lessons will run Tuesdays through Fridays with sessions starting every two weeks. On July 5, there will be two sessions offered at 9 a.m. and 11 a.m. They are offered to anyone of any age. If you don’t know how to swim and want to learn, just come to the San Manuel Pool. The teacher is WIA certified through Red Cross to teach swimming lessons.
Students attending the Summer School Enrichment classes will receive swimming lessons during the first session. Summer school starts June 6 at First Avenue Elementary School. The first two weeks, kids will enjoy crafts, fun physical education, bowling, cornhole and dancing. Summer school includes free breakfast and lunch for children ages zero through 18.
The pool will have the same rates to swim and will offer night swimming Wednesday, Friday and Saturdays from 6-9 p.m. And the ever popular movie nights will return to the San Manuel Pool. Lane rentals and pool party prices will be increasing, Lisa said, as soon as the Mammoth-San Manuel School Board approves the rates.
The pool would like to offer water aerobics, but an instructor is needed. Contact Lisa if you are or know of someone who can teach these classes.
Visit the Community Schools on Facebook at facebook.com/MSMCommunitySchools for all the swimming schedules as well as updates on events and sports.
And dig out those calculators or abacuses, whatever you need to guess how many gallons it will take to fill our empty pool.
There are news or informational items frequently written by staff or submitted to the Copper Basin News, San Manuel Miner, Superior Sun, Pinal Nugget or Oracle Towne Crier for inclusion in our print or digital products. These items are not credited with an author.
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