Nine years after the old Belmont Plaza Olympic Pool was demolished, the Long Beach City Council could approve a design for its replacement, which the city hopes to complete before the 2028 Olympic games.
At its Oct. 10 meeting, the council will be updated on the progress of the project, which was recently scaled back as the cost of construction escalated and the city’s future oil revenue fell into limbo due to a pending statewide law that could accelerate the end of oil operations.
The council could vote Tuesday on a city and staff-preferred design that was revealed to the public during a meeting in June. The project, estimated to cost about $74.2 million, would include just one 50-meter pool as well as an instructional pool and a recreational area that would include a vortex, spray jets and other features.
A report said that the project was preferred by city staff because it met the requirements handed down to the city by the California Coastal Commission to make a “significant” amount of the design available to the public for recreational use.
This version is significantly smaller than the design the Coastal Commission approved in February 2021. That design included six bodies of water and incorporated the temporary pool currently open at the site as part of the overall project.
However, that version had a funding gap of $25 million that grew to over $50 million, according to the city.
An earlier proposed project included a translucent dome, but it was challenged in court and the city opted to redesign it as an open-air facility.
The financial picture of how the city would pay for the project became even more complicated in December when the city said that the effects of Senate Bill 1137, which mandated 3,200-foot buffers between oil operations and sensitive areas like schools, parks and hospitals, could make it tougher to pay for projects funded with oil revenue, such as the Belmont Pool
In a memo last year, City Manager Tom Modica said that the law could hasten the end of oil production in Long Beach. The city anticipated it could continue pumping until 2035, but SB 1137 could move that date to 2029 instead. The shift could cost the city about $122 million over its first five years.
The city began looking at redesigning the pool after the bill was signed into law in 2022; however, whether SB 1137 goes into effect will be decided by California voters in the November 2024 election, after a referendum effort qualified for next year’s election.
If the council approves the staff-recommended version of the pool, it would still have a funding gap of about $8 million. Additional seating, shade structures and restroom capacity could cost another $3.7 million. The report also noted that the city could seek out private or philanthropic support to cover those costs.
The Oct. 10 City Council meeting is scheduled to begin at 5 p.m.