Upgrades to the Otumoetai Pool's changing rooms and toilets have been on hold because of concerns about the pool's stability, says TCAL chairman Warren Banks.

Tauranga City Council budgeted $350,000 to $500,000 to build new toilets and changing rooms in 2009.

Otumoetai Swimming Pool.

'We did get approval to spend the money but then we became aware the pool was perhaps unstable and sliding down the hill,” says Warren.

'Whether it was sliding uniformly, or one end more than the other – so we actually didn't know if the pool was going to crack and be basically useless.

'We've only just received confirmation based on a survey that it now has a 10 year life at least.

'It's true they did approve the money, but I wasn't prepared to spend it. I didn't want to spend the money there and find the pool was going to crack in half and all the money was going to be wasted. I got a kick in the arse for not doing it, but I just needed to be sure there was some life in the pool.”

Because of the contract TCAL has with the pool's two main users, Otumoetai College and swimming club, Warren says TCAL has no means of generating any income out of the Otumoetai Pool. It was always going to be a ratepayer funded capital upgrade.

'We think there's only seven per cent of the general public ever use the pool and its because they only ever have access to two lanes except for basically the school holidays and weekends,” says Warren.

The swim club has the pool from 6am till 7am, and from 3.30pm-7pm at night.

The school has it during school hours and the swim club has five of seven lanes booked outside of that.

'It's only school holidays and weekends when the public have access. If they had much better access then we might get a hell of a lot more people coming in,” says Warren.

TCAL's aquatic strategy has presented the councillors with a range of options, keep the status quo, vest it with an organisation like the swimming club, close it – if the survey results were bad, or maintain it for says, another 15 years and replace it with another.

'At the moment financially no one has the heart to talk about any of that,” says Warren.

Meanwhile it will be tidied up, with work beginning within a month on refurbishing the changing rooms and toilets.

'The problem we have there is as soon as we covered the pool with the big tent we trapped all the moisture, and it just sits in the change rooms. It's always going to be damp. That's one of the problems.

'We've got some quite big air handling infrastructure in there but it's still going to be damp in those change sheds. We are fighting the dampness all the time.”