GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – The Green Bay pools are just days away from opening. And for the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic, all three will be open.
Colburn Pool, Joannes Aquatic Center and Resch Aquatic Center’s first day back will be Saturday.
“We’re really excited that we are starting to turn a corner with our staffing issues,” said City of Green Bay Recreation Supervisor Ann Moeller.
In past years, the City of Green Bay has had trouble keeping all of it pools open due to a shortage of lifeguards and other staff members.
This year, the city raised wages for lifeguards to up to $18 dollars an hour.
Moeller says she believes an increase in pay is not the only reason the city was able to hire more staff for the summer.
“My staff — they like working with friends, and they’ve done a great job recruiting and referring friends to work at the facilities,” she said. “So, just a lot of word of mouth.”
Moeller adds another reason for the increase is lifeguard courses are also more accessible post pandemic.
“Courses are much more readily available. We’re also offering free training.”
Moeller says all three pools will be open this summer, but it will be a slow start.
“We aren’t quite fully staffed; we are very close. A lot of our hires still need to be trained. The first two weeks, we’re going to have some closures. It’s going to be a slow start and kind of a weird schedule, but we’re going to get there.”
Joannes Pool Director Madeline Eckberg said the past few weeks have been busy getting everything ready to go.
“Last couple days, we’ve had people here to help clean and get the facility all ready. We’ve had maintenance staff around fixing things, making sure everything is safe and ready to go.”
Eckberg said there has also been a lot of training.
“Yesterday, we had a dry land where we did CPR and AED training, and then tomorrow and Friday, we’ve got in-water training where we practice all the saves,” Eckberg explained.
Moeller says the city is still looking for a few more lifeguards for the season.
The City of Appleton says it is fully staffed and will have both of its pools open this summer. The City of Oshkosh will have its one pool open this summer and does not expect any closures.
