The Inglewood pool can take another few laps, as city council reversed course on a planned December closure date and provided cash to keep it open for two years.

After the 2025 budget was passed on Friday evening, Calgary city councillors voted to reconsider a prior motion to close the pool later in December 2024.  During the budget deliberations, they also voted in favour of funding the pool for the next two years and doing immediate repairs.

It gives the aging facility another two years – or until the MNP Centre is open – before another decision is to be made on its future. That future doesn’t come without a cost, however. City councillors reinstated operating funding of $400,000 in both 2025 and 2026, along with $400,000 for capital upgrades.

Ian Fleming, director of facilities management for the City of Calgary said that they would do $150,000 in immediate electrical upgrades, and the remaining $250,000 would give them a buffer in case more work was needed in the next two years.

“As long as everybody understands that I can’t guarantee it’s two years that this will remain open,” he said.

“This is going to be a band-aid to get us to when MNP opens.”

Fleming said they would do everything they could to ensure the building was as safe as possible.

“From a safety perspective, we’ll do everything we can with the budget. We have to make sure it’s safe. But again, we don’t usually run this type of asset to failure,” he said.

Ward 10 Coun. Andre Chabot, who put forward the motion to pull the cash from the surplus to cover the costs, said this was an important decision for many Calgarians.

“Since we first made the decision to do the early closure, we’ve heard from administration that there is a potential to support this facility, at least in the short term, with a modest capital investment,” he said.  

“Potentially, there are some risks. I hope everyone realizes that.”

Community effort rewarded say residents

Ward 9 Coun. Gian-Carlo Carra, who has voted in favour of the closure in the past, due to the financial impact of keeping an end-of-life pool open, said he was happy to keep it open for the interim.

Carra said that he had voted in favour of closing in order to give certainty to the user groups that were operating at the Inglewood pool location.

“Now that those groups, to the extent that’s possible, with the inventory of flat-water pools that exist in the city, have been given that notice, yeah, if we want to run it into the ground, let’s run it into the ground,” he said.

“This is not a smart financial decision, but it’s a recreation-forward decision.”

He also applauded the advocacy done around keeping the pool open.

Inglewood resident Marina Ortman said the community effort has been worth the struggle.

“It took a bit. We took beating, everybody took a beating – (Coun. Andre) Chabot especially,” Ortman said.

“You know what? One is understanding what people value and you’ve seen what happens. So, don’t give up.”

Fiona McKenzie said that she was unbelievably happy with the city council decision to keep the pool open for the interim.

“This is for not just Inglewood, but for the city,” she said.

“It’s great that the city is thinking about larger recreational centers. They’re needed, too. But we need the small, flatwater pools, just for seniors, for people with disabilities, for families, for low-income families. We need these community pools, too.”

Neither Ortman nor McKenzie were swayed by it only potentially being a temporary solution, that they’ve only given it a two-year extension.

“I think we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. We get more density, maybe it’ll be a different conversation,” she said.

“Just like Marina said, you can fight. The little community with heart and a lot of voices, that you can fight. So, to keep fighting if there’s something that you believe in.