Plans for a state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources grant for the Lansford Borough pool hit a snag that is delaying the grant process.

Aquatic Design Consultants of Louisburg, Kansas, did a feasibility study approximately six or seven years ago.

“That report is flawed,” Lansford Borough Council President Bruce Markovich told council members. “They put in their report that the pool is made of six inches of steel-reinforced concrete. The pool is not made of concrete; it was made of concrete blocks.”

The council’s plan was to send that feasibility study in and use the physical aspects of the pool, since those have not changed, and just update the public input part.

“We wanted to use that study because the studies cost about $16,000 to do,” Markovich said. “We sent the study to DCNR. Because of the mistakes on the study and the age of the public input, the study is useless. Everything that they were planning on doing to that pool was based on it being 6 inches of concrete.”

Several council members met with the Friends of the Lansford Pool on Monday. They decided to make whatever repairs they could for now, just to get the pool open. They will then work on getting a new feasibility study done to apply for the DCNR grant. Costs for doing the major work on the pool are approximately $875,000.

Vision Pools of Downingtown will be brought in to help with the emergency repairs to the pool. The plan is to install new skimmers, redo the concrete on the sidewalks, and do what repairs they can do to open the pool. Vision Pools will provide an estimate to the borough on the cost of those repairs.

“One more thing to add,” Markovich said. “We have $12,000 left in the DCED (Pa. Dept of Community and Economic Development) grant. We are checking with them to see if we can use that $12,000 to pay for the DCNR consultant to do the feasibility study. Other than that, we’ll have to send that money back.”

Past-due sewer fees

Shantel Lauer, Lansford’s assistant borough secretary, reported that the office was able to collect nearly all past-due sewer transmission fees.

“We started at around $35,000 in delinquent fees, and we have now collected money due from all but one of those persons,” Lauer reported. “There were also 10 people who had already been shut off by the Water Authority.”

“We’re good to go for 2023 with a clean slate,” said borough secretary Wendy Butrie.