Pool Proposal Likely to Return for Spring Vote

It is likely that a new plan for a pool at Patton Park will go before voters at Hamilton Town Meeting in April.

"It is inconceivable that it would not be addressed by then," said Marc Johnson, chairman of the Hamilton Board of Selectmen.

A plan for a $2.5 million pool project was two votes short of the needed 2/3 majority during a special Town Meeting earlier this month.

The Board of Selectmen is scheduled to meet with the Hamilton-Wenham Recreation Committee on Wednesday, Dec.  4 to work on the next steps.

Johnson said town officials may look at some other options for the project to gain support, including "value engineering" that would come up with several options with various price tags or finding ways that some portions of the project could be completed by the Department of Public Works to save money.

"The voters want to know more certainty on the cost and some voters want a lower cost," Johnson said.

Wenham town officials would also be invited to next week's meeting, Johnson said.

"We certainly want to bring Wenham to the table," he said.

Before the special town meeting this fall, the Wenham Community Preservation Committee voted against sending the pool project before voters to ask whether they wanted to use CPA money toward the pool costs.

The vote at the Special Town Meeting was to use a combination of existing funds and bond payments from Community Preservation Act money to pay for the project. Johnson said he expects that to continue to be the plan, calling it a "cost-effective mechanism" because of the state money that matches Hamilton's contribution of a 2 percent real estate tax surcharge.

It has yet to be determined whether the existing pool can open this summer. Johnson said he expects Town Manager Michael Lombardo to bring to the board a decision about whether the pool can be reopened this summer and the cost of work it may take, or whether it makes sense to keep it closed until it it removed and./or replaced.