Lower Makefield Pool Won't Open In 2020

LOWER MAKEFIELD TOWNSHIP, PA — The Lower Makefield Township Pool will not open in 2020 due to coronavirus concerns, officials announced Monday.

Members of the pool, which was scheduled to open May 24, received an email on Monday saying officials are announcing the 2020 closure "with great sadness."

"We all just hoped it would not affect us locally," wrote Monica Tierney, Lower Makefield's director of parks and recreation. "The truth is, there just isn't any avoiding the COVID-19 pandemic."

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Tierney said there was no way to make up for financial shortfalls that would have been caused trying to wait for it to be safe to open this year.

"I have spent hours and many sleepless nights calculating different scenarios, but we cannot accommodate for the financial shortfalls created by this disease," she wrote. "In every scenario we come up short financially, the only choice was to choose the best of the worst. In order to save the future financial stability of The Pool, we must close this year."

She noted that the pool is revenue-driven, meaning no tax money is used to run it. It also has a 6 to 8-week lead time, meaning that if pool staff got word to start opening it on May 1, it wouldn't be ready to open until July 1.

She said officials still hope to run Camp LMT, which is scheduled to begin in June.

Meanwhile, the township's entire parks and recreation department is taking a hit because much of its revenue comes from user fees from now-canceled or postponed events.

The department won't be hiring summer field maintenance workers, an intern or a full time laborer that had been budgeted for this year, Tierney wrote. Full-time pool staff have been reassigned in the parks and recreation department, she said.

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