April Newsletter to the Membership

Greetings from your president and other dedicated pool Board members. We hope that you have all been having an enjoyable and comfortable winter and are starting to mark off the days until our lovely little hideaway in the woods opens.  Your pool board has been working hard to ensure that the hideaway we love will be better than ever. I would like to update you on a number of initiatives that have begun as a result of the pool community’s input from last year’s meeting. The Board of Directors heard the comments and concerns of the members regarding the improvements that the membership felt we should address.

To recap, the priority improvements were to upgrade/improve the pump and pump room. The next two areas that you asked us to turn our attention to were the possibility of a new white coat and a pool cover. To offer a short explanation, the shell of the pool is made of a material called gunite.  Over that shell is a layer of white coat or Marcite.  This is a mixture of white cement and white marble dust.  This white coat provides a watertight seal over the more porous gunite beneath it.  Under ideal conditions, this white coat will last for 20 years, but it does degrade over time and eventually needs to be replaced.  Our pool, however, made a decision many years ago that painting the pool was a more economical direction to proceed.  This has not proven to be the case.  A small group of dedicated volunteers then spend hundreds of man-hours every year before opening to remove hundreds of pounds of leaves and other debris from the pool, scrape and clean off any old paint, and power wash the pool. We (actually Jeff Williams) would then spend well over a week looking for cracks and other abnormalities in the shell, which had to be patched and filled. Finally, we would spend about $1500 - $2000 to purchase paint and get a volunteer crew out to paint the pool. It is important that everyone understand the extent of time and effort required each year to prepare the pool for opening day.

 The third item recommended was a pool cover. This would be placed over the pool at the end of the season to keep out falling leaves, tree limbs, various animals and other flotsam that would accumulate in the pool over off-season.  Finally, the last number of items on the pool community’s list was improvement to the bathhouse, expansion of the sitting and picnic areas and other cosmetic improvements.

 We are very pleased to report that we will be able to accomplish two of the top three priorities prior to the opening of the pool this year. The pump is well on its way to becoming completely refurbished, rewired and upgraded. If you remember, the pump was not functioning properly and was the reason that the baby pool was closed several days towards the end of the season! Dave Schlebecker is completing all of these improvements. For those interested in the guts and the details please ask Dave, he is our life line and pump man extraordinaire!

Next on the agenda was investigating the feasibility of a new pool cover and a new “white coat.”  We would like to thank Joe Yanovitch for his exhaustive study into the various types of covers one could place over our pool.  Size, weight, type of installation, storage, size unrolled, size rolled! All of these and other items were adroitly addressed by Joe.  The “white coat” committee was comprised of Maureen Gunnison and a number of board members. We had four different pool contractors out and reviewed four different proposals. 

The board is pleased to announce that we have hired Commercial Pool Group “CPG” to “white coat” our pool. They began the first step, draining the pool, on Tuesday April 1st.  Next was mucking out the pool, removing the old tile, sandblasting to remove the many layers of paint, spackle and ready the pool for the new white coat.  After patching any problem areas, they will begin the application of the white coat. New tiles will be installed throughout the pool as well as many other things. We also acquired some “gently used” chairs from a pool in Virginia.  These were obtained free of charge except for the time and effort made by John Goggin, John Gunnison and Didier Richaudeau.  A special thanks to member Pat Cochran for this tip!  In addition, we purchased several picnic style tables with benches to increase out seating areas. In general, we anticipate a spanking new looking pool for this summer!!!

The result of these wonderful and needed pool improvements does not occur without a financial facet. The committee and especially Maureen Gunnison have been tireless in their search for the best possible solution to the financial situation. We are taking out a loan to help cover the payments to the contractor. It is important to mention that the contractor has been extremely accommodating in regards to payment.  We are requiring an assessment for all of the pool members this year in the amount of $50 per membership. This can be paid over two installments during the months of June and July.  This assessment will help pay down the debt. We also plan to entertain some rather inventive money-raising activities throughout the pool season to help us further cover the costs. If any of you are adept or have some good fundraising ideas, please let one of the board members know.

Finally we would like to tell you about some upcoming events

    Again, thank you all for being members of our little piece of heaven pool community. We are very excited about the improvements that the pool is currently undergoing and we are sure you will be pleased as well!  Why not ask a friend and/or neighbor to join.

    We look forward to seeing you at some, or all, of the upcoming activities.

 Laura Richaudeau

RENOVATIONS
RENEWALS
We need your renewals!  To that end, the board has made the decision to accept Paypal payments for your dues renewal.  You can even split that payment over several months to help keep the cost within a budget.  We've included those on-line payment options within the body of the email to make it even easier.  As you can see there are several options, so be sure to check it out, and if there any questions, please don't hesitate to contact the treasurer with the link below.		Here you will have a number of options in which to make your Annual Dues payment.  Please read over the options carefully and click on the correct button for payment through Paypal. 2 Installment Button - Paypal will automatically debit your account in 2 equal payments.  For more information see above. 1 Payment - A single debit to your account.
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