Pool's Future to Get Close Look by Committee

A subcommittee will take a close look at the Patton Park pool, which is in need of significant repairs.

The pool will likely need more work to open this summer, and Town Manager Michael Lombardo said that he is looking at what it will cost to keep open this summer.

But the committee will take a look at the pool's future for years to come.

On Monday, the Hamilton Board of Selectmen moved closer to defining the exact task of the recently formed Patton Park Pool subcommitee.

David Neill, chairman of the Board of Selectmen, said the pool could undergo further repairs or be replaced. It seemed as though the committee, which has met once, has already dismissed the possibility of replacing it with something more because of the high cost, he said.

"To walk away from the pool would be such a tragedy," Neill said.

In a recently completed Recreation Master Plan, it put a turf athletic field at the top of recreation needs for the community. Significant repairs or replacement of the pool was at No. 2.

The pool was constructed by the American Legion in 1961.

Jeff Hubbard, a selectman who also serves on the pool committee, said about 200 people per summer use the pool.

Selectmen are looking to make sure the committee has a specific task, or "charge," in line with its recently approved policy on ad hoc committees.

The committee should know exactly what it needs to do, and Selectman Jennifer Scuteri pointed to the Patton Family Estate Advisory Committee that was formed last year to take a look at the Patton estate gift to the town. It's job, Scuteri said, was one thing - to bring a recommendation to last year's Annual Town Meeting about whether the town should accept the gift. And it recommended that the gift be accepted and voters agreed.