OPRF delays decision on new pool facility

Oak Park and River Forest High School is not yet ready to say where it will build a new pool facility and how much the final cost will be.

This month was tentatively slated for a decision by the District 200 Board of Education. Three locations are being considered, the third added as recently as April. The school’s construction and design firms are currently studying the third site — Scoville Avenue between Ridgeland Common and OPRF’s South Field, extending from Lake Street to the viaduct.  

The two other sites — the parking garage at Lake Street and baseball field north of the stadium — have been on the table since early fall 2013. If a decision is made this summer, the facility won’t break ground until next summer, with two years of construction after that, according to the school’s tentative timeline. 

“That was tentative, and I think tentative was the key word,” Supt. Steven Isoye said concerning a decision this month. 

The price tag for the other two sites range from $20 to $70 million. A new pool site is also part of the school’s long-term facilities plan, which calls for revamping space in the building to accommodate a growing student population, Isoye said.  

A pool facility would be built by 2017, according to the school’s schedule. The third site option creates another wrinkle in the decision-making, given that it would require voter-approval via an election year referendum because it would be a free-standing building. No referendum is needed for the other two sites because those are considered “attached” to the main building. 

“It’s not a surprise because it’s a hard decision that this board is faced with, because we’re land-locked,” Isoye said. “It’s not easy. And the other piece is that we’re growing, based on our student population. As more students come in, with that comes growing pains, because we have to figure out where we’re going to fit all of them.”