MOOSE JAW — The City of Moose Jaw will enhance its safety efforts at both pools this year by adding more staff to both venues to keep a more watchful eye on patrons.
The city’s aquatic safety policy currently stipulates that two lifeguards must always be on duty for a one-to-75-bather ratio, but forthcoming amendments dictate that two qualified lifeguards must always be on deck, including for private rentals, a budget report explained. This change is the result of an internal review the community services department conducted last year after an incident at one of the pools.
While two lifeguards are typically scheduled at the Kinsmen Sportsplex and Phyllis Dewar pools, one sometimes serves as a swim or fitness instructor or performs tasks such as changeroom checks or pool tests, the document continued. This often leaves one lifeguard actively scanning the pool.
The review recommended that two lifeguards must be assigned exclusively to scanning the pool area while one or more lifeguards can be scheduled for swim lessons or fitness programming, the report said.
“Additional lifeguards stationed on the pool deck would ensure more vigilant supervision, faster response times and a safer environment for all swimmers,” the document added.
During its recent budget meeting, city council unanimously approved a request from community services for an extra $94,315 in operating funding to hire more aquatic staff to support increased lifeguard-to-patron ratios.
Community services currently employs seven full-time aquatic staff and 30 causal staff, while the extra funding will allow the department to recruit one new full-time staff member and two causal employees, the report said. The extra staff would work on weekday mornings and afternoons and would cover Saturday swim lessons and noon swims, resulting in an additional 2,950 staffing hours annually.
The report added that because aquatic programming has been performing so strongly, the department expects to see an increase in revenues from the Sportsplex pool program this year of $69,820.
Administration told council during the meeting that the city is operating its pools within the mandated provincial legislation. However, even with those minimum provincial standards, it’s important to have more lifeguards because of the layout of the pools, where the employees are positioned, and the fact that some employees are teaching swimming lessons.
Asked about liability issues, administration said the extra lifeguards are about enhancing services over protecting against lawsuits. Moreover, answering a question about liability was difficult because it depended upon the circumstances of the situation.
Coun. Patrick Boyle said he struggled with the cost of this request, especially since council had already approved other expensive initiatives and because the municipality was already meeting the minimum aquatic staffing standards.
“This represents a situation for us that can create a safety risk, and if something happens, we would be subject to litigation because of a known issue,” he added. “This is something we have to do to support safety and avoid a potential (lawsuit).”
