In September 2020, Kansas State University, better known as K-State or KSU, in Manhattan, KS, announced that it would close its natatorium for the fall semester and that the facility would be permanently shuttered within three years. Friday, KSU announced an acceleration of its plans to close the facility permanently, per KMAN Radio.
Citing ongoing maintenance issues and $4 million in needed repairs, the university will not foot the bill. Due to the facility’s designation as a recreational facility, it is ineligible to receive money from the Educational Buildings Fund, an account presided over by the Kansas board of regents used to maintain educational buildings throughout the state.
Though K-State has not had a varsity swim team since 1976 when the “Wildkittens” had to fund their own program, the Natatorium has served as the center for all aquatics-related activities in Riley County, Geary County, Potowatamie County, Marshall County, and Clay County for decades.
Since the closure of the Natatorium, swimmers in Manhattan have been without a local indoor pool–the nearest is located in Wamego, approximately 25 minutes east (by car) of the KSU Natatorium. Fortunately for residents of the Little Apple, a 6-lane indoor pool is coming to Manhattan in the form of Genesis Health Clubs, which is in the process of opening a new facility in Manhattan.
June through August, Manhattan residents have access to lane space at the City Park Pool, CiCo Park Pool, and Northview Pool. Summer 2021, however, will likely see CiCo Park Pool closed, due to “staffing and infrastructure challenges in many departments, including the parks division technicians who are critical to opening and operating the pools’ water chemistry, pumps, filters and other components to ensure safe water multiple times a day,” according city manager Ron Fehr, per the Manhattan Mercury newspaper. As of Sunday, February 28th, over 600 people have signed a petition called ‘Reopen All Manhattan City Pools‘ to keep all taxpayer-funded pools open in Manhattan for the summer of 2021.
Sounds like a well-coordinated long term plan by the University to get rid of the facility by not doing needed repairs in a timely manner and then using “the facility is in need of myriad repairs” as a reason to deep six it. Disgusting!
Taxpayer funded and Kansas in the same sentence. This must be a joke…is it April first?
Welcome to my future…heading to Manhattan in a few months. Part of the repairs required are subsequent to an investigation after covid (ventilation issues–which I’m certain would apply to almost every indoor pool on the planet–ever been to Federal Way or any other pool I swam in growing up). The health club has been threatening to open up a pool for 2 years…sadly the owner owes almost 500,000 in back taxes from his health club empire (trying to get the state legislature to waive) and so this pool will likely never see the light of day (of course anytime you call the club an employee will dutifully reply “it is supposed to be open next month”). Sad day that a… Read more »
Which health club is that?
Genesis
Trying to keep all that 600 Million in Endowment for “other things”, 4 million is just too much..
I don’t have the exact numbers but in 1970 there were about 100 LCM pools in the world and 80% of them were in the United States. We dominated swimming so much that swimming the 400 free relay was cut from the Olympics and a countries representation per event was cut to 2. We are now going in the opposite direction.
No. Its economics and aging equipment management. This pool was built in the 70s amd has ran for near 50 years without the help of having a collegiate program constantly asking for money to maintain it.
A good comparison would be NC States pool 25y pool. Its just as old but has been adjusted, renovated and upgraded because theres always been a college team pushing for the funding.
As for the olympics part, if you havent seen the insane speeds of freshmen this year in conference champs, youre blind. Swimming is booming in the US.
Terrible news not only for competitive swimming the area, but for recreational swimming as well. Students, faculty, and staff at KSU will have very limited choices.
In other words…. we need more money for football and basketball so who cares about a pool
Anybody else repulsed by all of the “unveilings” of the locker rooms for football that have gone through millions in renovations. The pods where they can sleep, game, study. I know that most, if not all, is funded by boosters, but it’s just so over the top when other sports are lucky to keep their program alive.
Genesis health club is the most expensive gym, I find it difficult to believe that college students will fit that bill
I think the point is that the club teams in Manhattan will be using the Genesis pool.
Club teams using the Genesis pool? That’s a totally new concept to me. Genesis isn’t going to kick out their members from the pool so club teams can use it
They will probably have lanes reserved for a certain amount of time for the clubs. Its great revenue for them- they are getting paid for the lanes but the swimmers don’t enjoy any other club benefits. Its also a chance to try to entice some into becoming members.
I don’t think the issue will be getting access but the increased cost and the swimmers crammed into 6 lanes instead of 8.