Taking a deep dive into Acadia University's decision to close its
pool
Richard Woodbury
| CBC News | Posted: June 8, 2025 9:00 AM | Last Updated: 2
hours ago
Documents shed light on the university's reasoning
Image | Acadia University pool
Caption: Acadia University's pool opened in 1967. To remain
open, the university says it would need extensive repairs,
including fixing a substantial leak and replacing mechanical
systems like filtration and HVAC. (Pat Callaghan/CBC)
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Three times a week, 91-year-old Shirley Marston drives seven
minutes to go for a morning swim at the Acadia Athletics
Complex in Wolfville, N.S.
She usually does about 24 lengths and goes to a local coffee
shop afterwards with some friends, including some who exercise
at the recreation facility. Swimming is good for her mind and
body, she says.
But by next Sunday, Marston's routine will change when Acadia
University closes its 58-year-old pool.
"I have a few things in my mind, but I don't know whether
they'll work or not," she said. "But right now, I'll keep
trying to find a place to swim."
The nearest indoor pools to Wolfville are in Windsor,
Waterville and Greenwood.
Image | Shirley Marston
Caption: Shirley Marston, 91, has been swimming at the Acadia
pool for 40 years. She swims there almost year-round, but swims
in the Gaspereau Canal in the summer months. (Julie Marston)
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In February, the Annapolis Valley university announced it was
closing the pool, citing persistent annual deficits and a
lengthy list of needed repairs. As well, the university said
prolonging the pool's life would require a two-year shutdown.
The announced closure came as a shock to many. But reports
prepared for the Town of Wolfville and the Municipality of the
County of Kings have for years cautioned that the pool's days
were numbered.
A 2022 regional recreational centre feasibility study prepared
for the county noted the pool is "outdated and functionally is
unable to meet the needs and expectations of patrons." The
report said it was reasonable to assume the pool might close in
three to five years.
* As community interest in saving Wolfville pool rises,
university says repair costs have doubled
* 'Shock and disbelief': Acadia University pulling the plug
on its aging pool
A 2015 report prepared for the town noted the pool required
resources to maintain that were beyond the scope of the
university and the town.
Wolfville Mayor Jodi MacKay said it's been convenient for the
town to have a non-government entity like the university
operate a pool used extensively by community members.
"It's always harder to move faster when you have an option
that's already there for you," she said. "And now that there
isn't an option, it kind of does light that fire under us."
MacKay, who served two terms as a town councillor before being
elected mayor last fall, said discussions about the need for a
new pool go back as long as she was on council, but only really
heated up in the past four years, along with the discussion
about a regional recreation complex.
Image | acadia pool
Caption: A notice about the pool closure is shown on a door at
Acadia University on Feb. 10, 2025. (Pat Callaghan/CBC)
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The COVID-19 pandemic and the housing crisis just complicated
matters.
"We're a small municipality, so ... we only have a limited
number of staff and a limited budget," said MacKay. "So we do
the best we can with what we have."
Kings County Mayor Dave Corkum said the municipality will soon
be announcing the purchase of land that will one day house a
regional recreational complex that would include a pool. He
said they are about halfway through the process, but the
finished complex won't likely be open until late 2028.
"It's a situation that's unfortunate," he said. "If maybe this
had been known three, four years prior to [now], maybe the
current new facility that we're trying to build, [we] may have
been able to fast-track it a little bit more and hopefully get
it off the ground."
Escalating repair costs
When the university announced the closure on Feb. 10, it said
repairs would cost more than $3 million. Problems included the
pool leaking a substantial amount of water and mechanical
systems like filtration and HVAC being at the end of their
life.
But when the community pushed back, the university asked an
engineering firm to take a second look. On Feb. 15, repair
costs were pegged at between $5 million and $7 million.
"Additional concerns include unknown structural deterioration,
leakage damage, and groundwater pressure, all of which add
complexity and cost," the university wrote on its website.
'Rushed and hasty'
Meg Shephard, a member of the Save Acadia Pool group, has a
daughter who just wrapped up her third year on the university's
swim team. Shephard is critical of the decision to close the
pool.
"When the news first came out, it seemed very rushed and
hasty," said Shephard.
She'd like to see the pool in operation until a new facility
can be constructed.
The university has cited an annual $400,000 operating deficit,
but Shephard said that's misleading because about half of that
comes from costs for running the varsity swim team, such as
coaching, events, team travel and scholarships.
The university declined an interview request, noting it has
been providing information to the public, including posting
completed freedom of information packages, on its website.
"At this time, we cannot respond to inquiries or provide
interviews related to the closure of the swimming pool due to
threatened legal action by some members of the swim team and
their parents," it said in a statement to CBC.
Documents shed light on university's reasoning
The documents show that a month before announcing the closure,
university officials pondered other options, including agreeing
to keep the pool open until spring 2026 as it carried out a
feasibility study.
"Just thinking, for the cost of keeping it open likely for one
more year, we could take a more defendable community-informed
approach to this decision and leave less people in the cold,"
wrote Scott Duguay, vice-president of student experience, in a
Jan. 11 email to university president Jeff Hennessy and another
official.
The move would also give swim team members more time to
consider their options.
Hennessy replied a day later that he was OK with the pool
staying open another year to allow for communications and
design plans to be developed.
Image | Jeff Hennessy at Acadia
Caption: Acadia University president Jeff Hennessy is shown in
a 2016 file photo. (CBC)
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"The problem with community consultation on this is we're not
likely to listen to them if they have a different view than we
do," he wrote.
"We could find $5 million under the mattress and we're still
going to close the pool because we wouldn't spend that money
fixing it and we have better options for the space."
A month later, as the university had an engineering firm take a
second look at options for the pool, Acadia officials discussed
how to phrase the update on the website.
"For a 7 year life extension the pool needs a comprehensive
renewal," Marcel Falkenham, the university's executive director
of facilities, wrote on Feb. 14.
'Hope dies today!': University president's email
Hennessy thought that point should be left out.
"The message has to be this is not possible because the
building could collapse," he wrote. "Not in those words, but
that has to be what people hear and it's the truth. If we say
comprehensive renewal could give us 7 more years, that's still
hope. Hope dies today!"
The final three words are particularly painful for Shephard.
"To see a university president say, 'Hope dies today!' when you
see that his team is actually trying to do the right thing and
he just shuts it down, it's heartbreaking," she said.
Image | Wolfville Sign Acadia
Caption: The Town of Wolfville contributes $60,000 annually to
help cover the pool costs at Acadia. (Robert Short/CBC)
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A business plan was prepared for the university's athletics
complex in 2019. On the subject of the pool, it recommended
that the university not make a unilateral decision to close it
because of its importance to the broader community.
Corkum, elected last October, doesn't know what conversations
took place between the municipality and Acadia before then.
Corkum said that when the pool closure was announced, he
suggested working with the university to find options.
"And the president of Acadia at that time, Jeff Hennessy, made
it clear to me that I should not be providing any false hope to
people, that the pool was going to be closed and that they felt
they had no choice," said Corkum.
"And at the end of the day, it is their pool and I have to
respect that decision."
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