To the editor:

After reading the latest on the proposed pool facility, I am left with a big load of bad feelings.

As a child of 7, I earned my Red Cross swimming certification in the waters of Deer Lake. Every sunny summer day my brothers and sisters and I would swim and play for hours on the beaches and in the waters of our beautiful pool called Puget Sound. So many good memories of that time. Now and then our mother would take us to visit friends at Mutiny Sands or Sandy Hook and we would play in the heated pools that those communities provided to their residents at their expense.

As a young mother, I took my children to swimming lessons in various pools across South Whidbey, but in the end they much preferred their time spent in the Sound and the lakes on the Island.

Through the years there has been much talk about a community pool, but always with strings attached — meeting facilities, tennis courts, basketball courts, kitchens, lap pools, leisure pools AND lap pools, hot tubs and saunas, etc., etc., etc. People want to have everything that the communities they moved from had.

When I see quotes in the paper that point at property owners pocket change — “If you own property, even in tough times, how hard can it be to save your loose change and come up with $5 a month?” — I become incensed at the arrogance and pomposity that the promoter of the pool facility displays. Many young families and homeowners who are finding themselves pinching pennies for that last $5 of food at the end of the month, and so many senior citizens are struggling daily in this current economic nightmare we find ourselves in. To make a comment like that really stinks.

The general population would like to have a public pool. I will be the first to admit that the cold waters of the lakes and Sound are not the most comfortable places to swim but sure are invigorating. If the powers that be on the rec center commission could come up with a pool facility at a reasonable price for us taxpayers to consider I might consider it. But as it exists in their minds now, it is not only over the top but not practical to consider in these tough times.

I will be one to vote “no” on the pool facility when I see it on the ballot this fall.

Emily Schmidt

Langley