BUCKLAND — After offering up congratulations for hard work and good fortune in receiving a $500,000 donation for a new swimming pool, the Selectboard hired Peter Lapointe of Archimetrics Design Studio to conduct a pool replacement feasibility study for the town’s future pool. Lapointe, a former Buckland resident who now lives in Ashfield, will receive $9,600 for a study that includes:
A field study of existing conditions, including topography, improvements and wetland boundaries of the entire Buckland Recreation Area.
A summary report that will include design parameters for the pool replacement, and potential sites for relocating the pool, and cost comparisons of each.
A public presentation of the findings to the town.
Selectboard Chairwoman Dena Willmore said this survey is needed to determine the best place for locating the new pool and septic system.
“There is no way to plan a pool without considering these steps,” said Town Administrator Andrea Llamas. “We’re trying to do it with an eye towards (the fact that) this only happens once every 50 years. We don’t want to make any mistakes.”
Members of the Recreation Committee thanked the anonymous donor who gave the $500,000 donation. This summer was the first in 52 years that Buckland was without a pool, since the old pool, built in 1962, was leaking and is in too poor a shape to go on for another summer. However, town officials thought it would be years before the town had enough to build a new pool. Also, the old pool, which has been removed, was too close to the flood plain of the Clesson Brook River, as was the septic system. The new plan is to build an L-shaped “zero entry” pool, with a shallow area for children and the elderly to enter. Current plans are to put the new pool further from the brook.