Glassell Park Rec Center Pool to be Closed Starting August 12

Summer is a time when many families in and around Eagle Rock splash around in swimming pools. After all, the kids aren’t in school, there’s time to kill—and it’s hot.

But there’s some bad news around the corner for anyone who enjoys swimming at the Glassell Park Recreation Center, the closest community swimming pool in the Eagle Rock area: Starting August 12, the pool will be closed—yet another victim of the City’s never-ending budget cuts.

The Olympic-size pool has long been used for competitions by students, who also use a City pool on the outskirts of the , across from the school campus.

“August is our hottest month and we’re devastated,” said Claudia Estrada, the manager of the pool, which is located a stone’s throw from the crossing on Eagle Rock Boulevard and Verdugo Road.

“That’s awful,” Gina Biehn, a Glassell Park resident who visits the pool regularly with her preteen son, told Patch Monday when informed about the pool’s impending closure. “Soon, people are going to have no libraries, no schools, nowhere to go—what are kids meant to do on all these [vacation] days?”

Visitors can sign a petition against the pool’s closure at the reception area for the facility at the recreation center. An online petition can also be signed by clicking this link and pleas made to the office of Council Member Eric Garcetti, who is running for mayor and under whose jurisdiction the Glassell Park Rec Center falls, at (323) 478-9002. Click here to join an 'Occupy Glassell Park' Facebook campaign to oppose the pool's imminent shutdown.

The City of Los Angeles' Citywide Aquatics Division, where Aquatic Director Jon Kopitke and Acting Principal Recreatiion Supervisor I Trish Delgado have their offices, can be reached at (323) 906-7953. The division's e-mail address is citywide.aquatics@lacity.org.