North Long Beach could be getting its own public pool in the years ahead.
The City Council voted at its Tuesday, Aug. 3, meeting to direct city staff to explore potential locations and funding options for a public pool in the neighborhood.
North Long Beach is farther than any other area of the city from Long Beach’s three public pools, which are in Belmont Shore, Central Long Beach and West Long Beach.
Vice Mayor Rex Richardson, who represents the city’s northernmost Ninth District, brought the item to the panel. He said building a public pool in North Long Beach is a matter of equity in many ways, including when it comes to addressing the impacts of climate change.
The parts of the city that are farthest from the coast — notably, North Long Beach — are getting hotter more quickly than other parts of the city, he noted, because of climate change.
The neighborhood has “more days above 85 degrees in a given year than any other area of the city,” he said. “Every year, it’s going to get hotter. That’s just a reality. And the reality is, the people — particularly the children that live in the North Long Beach community — live the farthest away from the beach and the farthest away from pools.
“To me, this is a climate issue,” Richardson added. “It’s a neighborhood quality issue. It’s a quality-of-life issue. It’s an invest-in-youth issue. It’s an equity issue.”
Councilman Al Austin, whose Eighth District also includes part of North Long Beach, pointed out that the neighborhood is also home to more people of color than many other areas of the city. He said giving them access to a public pool could help diversify water sports and aquatics citywide.
“I think opportunities should be extended to areas of the city where they traditionally haven’t been,” Austin said, “and when given opportunities, young Black kids and Brown kids can certainly rise to the occasion and take full advantage of the aquatics experience that there’s a void of today.”
As for potential locations, Austin said the park in Carmelitos, Davenport Park and Ramona Park are all realistic options.
City Manager Tom Modica said his staff would explore those areas and analyze how much the project would cost. While there currently isn’t any money allocated for a potential pool, Modica said he recognized that the idea is to put a plan together so that whenever funding does become available, the city is ready to act.
Still, he said, it will likely be years before North Long Beach sees its own pool open up to the public.
“A project like this needs to start somewhere, and we’re starting tonight,” he said, “but it does take some time to get it done.”
