The City of Victoria is putting some money behind its motion to replace the Crystal Pool.
Council voted Thursday to find room in its 2023 budget for $1.78 million to restart the Crystal Pool replacement project.
The money, which will fund consulting services for project management and feasibility studies, will come from the city’s Buildings and Infrastructure Reserve fund.
The 52-year-old facility, which is responsible for 40 per cent of the city’s greenhouse gas emissions, is now at the point where replacement is a wiser option than repair, according to city staff reports.
Maintenance of the facility costs the city about $2 million a year.
The previous council left the issue of replacing Crystal Pool for this council to deal with, after it was left out of the 2022 strategic plan due to the pandemic.
The city has talked about replacing Crystal Pool for years; the last plan in February 2020 featured a return to an earlier design for a 50-metre pool and fitness centre.
Over the past four years, the city has spent about $2 million on pre-construction planning and design, with very little to show for it.
The impact of undertaking the work on Crystal Pool is expected to mean a year-long delay for the city’s plan for work on the Crystal Garden decarbonization system, the Green Buildings strategy, and chiller replacement at Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre.
A referendum on the project is expected to be held in 2024 and will include a binding question on the public’s willingness to borrow to build a new recreation centre, and a non-binding question about the centre’s location and amenities.
Location options are likely to be in or near the North Park neighbourhood.
While the notion to include funding for the first phase of the project passed unanimously Thursday, Coun. Chris Coleman tried to temper any excitement around the table.
“You will forgive me if I do feel a little bit like Groundhog Day number three or four — I’ve seen variations of the roadmap a number of times,” he said, adding before council gets too far ahead of itself and starts throwing around ideas for amenities to be included, city staff need to get to work on the first phase of how the project can come back to life.
A referendum on Crystal Pool is inevitable as the city is required to seek public guidance for capital projects that break the $50-million threshold.
Some estimates have suggested a new facility could cost $100 million.
The previous council had replacement estimates closer to $70 million, though that was before the spectre of supply-chain issues, inflation and labour shortages.
