Updates!! One Week Until Opening!!
With one week until we open, I wanted to bring you up to date on our readiness.
By now you may have noticed all our sunbrellas are up, including the new one in the Southeast corner, which replaced the unit that wouldn’t close last year and was damaged in a windstorm. The pool furniture is out on the deck - we had only a few units get broken last season so this is the first year we haven't had to order new chaises and covers. 'Swifty' (our robotic pool vacuum) is up in Pennsylvania getting repaired, so you'll see NVPools staff at the pool operating a manual vacuum to get the water to the state we've come to expect. The water heaters for the restrooms were replaced, and we should have the playground equipment inspected and sanded where necessary. We may have to close the sand pit playset for a day during the season to have it restained, but we'll let you know. If we can, we'll postpone the restaining until September after the pool has closed. A big ‘thank you’ is due for Mr. Mike Ebert, who has reworked our Pi-based dashboard system can use new middleware to keep folks up to date. Please note that if you bookmarked the dashboard – the web address has changed. Please bookmark https://io.adafruit.com/ebertmp/dashboards/greenbriar-pool-club?kiosk=true – the pool website has been updated.
Alexis Fitzgerald will be managing the NVPools staff, and we're glad to see so many of our previous guards returning, as well as a couple new faces. They're all looking forward to the season, so let's all work to live up to our reputation as a club that has a real sense of community, and is respectful to each other and to the staff. Board members will be present for most of opening weekend, to welcome folks back and to be available in case a quick decision is needed. Members are reminded that there are no guests permitted on opening weekend.
This week you'll see a bunch of kids at the pool on Monday the 19th (or another day if Monday is rainy). Because our swim and dive teams are both large AND young, we've brought in staff to run swimsafe tests for the team members. This benefits everyone, because we won't have hundreds of team members clamoring to take swimsafe tests during the first weeks of the normal season. Of course, the drawback (for the kids) to taking the test early is that the water and air temps can be cooler than once we're open. This is the first year we've tried this, and if it goes well and there's interest we may do the same thing next year and open up slots for an 'early' swimsafe test to the membership at large.
As we gear up for another fantastic season, we’re excited to bring back some of your favorite special events—like Late Nights for adults and teens!
To make these events successful, we need your help! Volunteers are essential to keeping things fun, safe, and running smoothly. Whether you can lend a hand for setup, check-in, or just keeping an eye on things, your support makes all the difference. Keep an eye out for upcoming SignUp Genius links and event dates! We’d love to have you involved. Thanks for being a part of what makes our pool community so great!
The last thing I want to make you aware of is a recent request by some members who are parents of children at Greenbriar East (GBE). I'm sure that everyone who lives in the neighborhood is aware of how the GBE student load has grown significantly in the last few years, enough that the county has had to cover the blacktop playground with four portable classrooms, and that there's probably going to be a redrawing of the borders between the elementary schools in our region. Because the blacktop playground where GBE normally holds their sixth grade promotion party is unavailable, and the other open spaces on the school grounds don't have access to power and water for the food or activities, the parent members asked if they could use the pool parking lot for the party on June 10. Further complicating the issue is that the parents were given the responsibility for the party quite recently, and a greatly reduced budget, so they did not have lots of time to explore alternatives.
Because the pool is open at that time, the Board decided that we did NOT want to completely close the parking lot (and the pool with it), but we came up with a compromise. It's our plan to cone/tape off a section of the parking lot (along the wall near the park and dumpster area) and leave the Point Pleasant gate closed until 4 PM. The Middle Ridge gate would be open, and members would be able to park on the Middle Ridge side of the parking lot, or on Middle Ridge drive itself, and the pool would stay open to the membership. We will have GBE volunteers ensuring the kids stay in "their" area, and we ask that the members take extra caution while there are activities on the parking lot. There was a LOT of discussion about this by the Board. Our normal practice is to keep the facility (pool/lots) for the exclusive use of the membership, particularly during the time when the pool is open. But we also recognize that the Board and our membership are part of this community, and we try to help the community out when we can without limiting member access to the facility. The majority of the Board felt that this was a reasonable compromise under an extraordinary set of constraints, so we're going forward. Members are cautioned that this is NOT likely to happen again. While the decision is made, I do want feedback from the membership - please send me a message (president@greenbriar.org) letting me know if you support or disagree with the Board's decision, and your reasoning.