{"id":1313551,"date":"2019-08-14T14:04:00","date_gmt":"2019-08-14T20:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/officials-break-ground-on-new-aquatic-facility\/"},"modified":"2019-08-14T14:04:00","modified_gmt":"2019-08-14T20:04:00","slug":"officials-break-ground-on-new-rifle-aquatic-facility","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/local-news\/officials-break-ground-on-new-rifle-aquatic-facility\/","title":{"rendered":"Officials break ground on new Rifle aquatic facility"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"swift-gallery p402_hide\" readability=\"6.6744186046512\">\n<ul id=\"imageGallery-985987-657\" class=\"gallery list-unstyled\">\n<li data-thumb=\"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2019\/08\/PoolReno-rct-081519-2-150x150.jpg\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2019\/08\/PoolReno-rct-081519-2.jpg\" data-sub-html=\"Kyle Mills \/ Citizen Telegram | Rifle residents, public officals and contractors find a little shade during last Friday\u2019s groundbreaking ceremonies at Art Dague Pool and Water Slide. The city offically closed the 50-year-old facilty to make way for the renovation and expansion of the aquatic facility.\" class=\"h-100\" readability=\"0\">\n<div class=\"caption\" readability=\"11\">\n<p><strong>Rifle residents, public officals and contractors find a little shade during last Friday\u2019s groundbreaking ceremonies at Art Dague Pool and Water Slide. The city offically closed the 50-year-old facilty to make way for the renovation and expansion of the aquatic facility.<\/strong><br \/>Kyle Mills \/ Citizen Telegram<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"row no-gutters h-100\">\n<div class=\"col my-auto\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.postindependent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2019\/08\/PoolReno-rct-081519-2.jpg\" alt=\"Rifle residents, public officals and contractors find a little shade during last Friday\u2019s groundbreaking ceremonies at Art Dague Pool and Water Slide. The city offically closed the 50-year-old facilty to make way for the renovation and expansion of the aquatic facility.\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li data-thumb=\"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2019\/08\/PoolReno-rct-081519-2-1-150x150.jpg\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2019\/08\/PoolReno-rct-081519-2-1.jpg\" data-sub-html=\"Kyle Mills \/ Citizen Telegram | Heavy equipment works on demolishing the deck around the Art Dague Pool and Waterslide Tuesday in Rifle. The renovation and expansion of the aquatic facility is underway on the project in Metro Park.\" class=\"h-100\" readability=\"-1\">\n<div class=\"caption\" readability=\"9\">\n<p><strong>Heavy equipment works on demolishing the deck around the Art Dague Pool and Waterslide Tuesday in Rifle. The renovation and expansion of the aquatic facility is underway on the project in Metro Park.<\/strong><br \/>Kyle Mills \/ Citizen Telegram<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"row no-gutters h-100\">\n<div class=\"col my-auto\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.postindependent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2019\/08\/PoolReno-rct-081519-2-1.jpg\" alt=\"Heavy equipment works on demolishing the deck around the Art Dague Pool and Waterslide Tuesday in Rifle. The renovation and expansion of the aquatic facility is underway on the project in Metro Park.\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p class=\"caption-toggle\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/rifle\/officials-break-ground-on-new-aquatic-facility\/#\" class=\"show-captions\">Show Captions<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/rifle\/officials-break-ground-on-new-aquatic-facility\/#\" class=\"hide-captions\">Hide Captions<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">With the excited giggles and the splashing of water filling the air of Metro park as children and their families enjoyed the last day of the pool, Jessica Wilson, new aquatics manager for the city of Rifle, watched and reflected on what the pool meant to her.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u201cThe pool has always been something I\u2019ve known. It\u2019s heartbreaking that this is leaving, but at the same time I\u2019m really excited,\u201d Wilson said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">For Wilson the pool renovation is very personal.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u201cMy mom used to run the pool, so I grew up here,\u201d Wilson said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Wilson is the daughter of Linda Stilson, who was the longtime manager of the pool until her unexpected death in 2014.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">A lifeguard for many years, Wilson and Austin Rickstrew, recreation coordinator of aquatics, both started in April to help keep the old pool going and to help usher in the new pool and era.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u201cJust getting to today is a big moment. We\u2019ve been holding the pool together with duct tape,\u201d Rickstrew said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u201cIt\u2019s ready to be replace. Some of the stuff here is original to when the pool was built.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Less then 24 hours after the residents gathered to celebrate the memories of five decades of the pool at the Ute Theater, city of Rifle officials broke ground on the new pool last Friday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u201cIts so exciting to actually have this happen, it has been such a long process,\u201d Rifle Mayor Barbara Clifton said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u201cWe had a few bumps in the road with some of the initial budget constraints, but to actually see this happening makes it real. Before it was all conceptual in my mind, but the construction equipment and the stakes make it incredibly exciting.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">For Tom Whitmore, Rifle parks and recreation director, breaking ground last week was the culmination of a project that began at the end of 2014, with a community survey going out in 2016.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">The City Council decided the pool would become the city\u2019s number one priority after the municipal water plant was built in 2017. Voters approved the renovation and expansion plan in September of the same year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">The project had to be put on hold after the planned renovation came in over budget. The city went back to the drawing board and revised the planned aquatics facility.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u201cWe prioritized our pool components of the survey, and when we realized we couldn\u2019t do some of the work because of the costs, we looked at the priorities,\u201d Whitmore said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Two major components the city focused on were the leisure pool with the aquatic structure and the lap lane pool.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u201cThose were some of the higher priorities, so we had to drop some of the other things. Hopefully those can be added back in at a later date if everything goes well with the economy in a few years,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Work began Monday on clearing the site between the existing pool and the Police Department.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u201cWe have a plan, and our objective is to safely and efficiently get things out of the way so FCI (project general contractor) can move in and start their work,\u201d Whitmore said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Whitmore said the new pool loan would be paid for with money that is already in the budget and with the help of grants, city and capital funds no new taxes will be needed to pay for the project.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u201cMostly it\u2019s the Parks and Rec sales tax \u2018Penny working for you\u2019 that voters passed in 2005 that will pay off the loan,\u201d Whitmore said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u201cThe theme for the issues committee was no new taxes, and so far that\u2019s where we are at, and we don\u2019t need any new taxes to make it happen.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText Tagline\"><a href=\"mailto:kmills@postindependent.com\">kmills@postindependent.com<\/a><\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/rifle\/officials-break-ground-on-new-aquatic-facility\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">via:: Post Independent<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Rifle residents, public officals and contractors find a little shade during last Friday\u2019s groundbreaking ceremonies at Art Dague Pool and Water Slide. The city offically closed the 50-year-old facilty to make way for the renovation and expansion of the aquatic facility.Kyle Mills \/ Citizen Telegram Heavy equipment works on demolishing the deck around the Art [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[160],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1313551","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-local-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-09-07 07:05:19","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSKE Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1313551","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1313551"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1313551\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1313551"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1313551"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1313551"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}