The future of the Highland Park pool became the subject of a passionate 60-minute discussion at Tuesday night’s city council meeting, as a citizen-led group, “Friends of the Guthrie Pool,” presented fundraising progress and made a formal plea for a larger, more ambitious aquatic facility.
Joe Chappell, representing the committee, announced that the group has raised an impressive $290,000 in pledges from just 26 donors in a single month. The funds he explained demonstrate a strong community desire for a new pool, but not the one currently proposed.
The pool, which was closed down in 2023, will not be opened for the 2026 swim season (May – August), and now 2027 is on the board for possibly another season of no swimming inside Highland Park.
The current plan, which came out of the Capital Improvement Plan (CIP) committee, outlines a 1,500 sq ft zero-entry pool with a total project cost of approximately 2.1 million. A large portion of that cost, city staff noted, is tied to the complete overhaul of the non-compliant bathhouse, chemical house, and surrounding infrastructure, which is required by the State Department of Health. The construction of the pool itself is estimated at 750,000.
“When I talk to a lot of people here in Guthrie, they really can’t see spending 2 million for a 1,500-foot pool,” Chappell told the council. “That pretty much seems to be the general consensus.”
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Chappell contrasted the modest proposal with the community’s former 7,000 sq ft pool and pointed to more robust aquatic centers recently built in smaller Oklahoma towns like Hennessey, Cushing, and Alva. Alva, for instance, recently completed a 6 million facility, financed through a combination of private donations and a 1.9 million city loan.
The “Friends of the Guthrie Pool” are asking the council to delay a final decision on the pool’s design to allow them more time to raise funds for a more substantial project. The group suggested a six-month timeline with progress reports every three months. Council members expressed support for the group’s efforts but also voiced concerns over the risks of delay, including construction cost inflation—estimated at over 5% annually, and new state regulations that could further increase expenses.
The council also discussed two larger, schematic-only options that were previously priced: a 2,300 sq ft pool estimated at 2.8 million and a 3,000 sq ft version for 3.5 million.
The pool committee could not give the council an idea about the size of the pool they would like to see, or an exact amount of dollars they are looking to raise.
The central challenge remains to balance the community’s desire for a quality, sizable pool against the financial realities and ticking clock of construction costs. The council took no formal action but is considering the committee’s request to revisit the issue in 90 days.
“We just like to believe that if they can do it, so can we,” Chappell said, referencing the success of neighboring towns. “We just need to have a can-do attitude.”
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