CLEVELAND — The City of Cleveland finally opened Greenwood Pool in the Ohio City neighborhood on Aug. 6, after residents raised concerns when it didn’t open as expected at the start of summer.
Monday, the city told me via email that in-house personnel did the pool repairs and that the pool is “back open until the end of the season on August 16.”
I asked what exact repairs were made and how much those repairs cost, but did not receive answers.
The pool became a hot topic when it remained unfilled after swim season started.
Neighbors ended up launching a campaign to get answers from the city and demand that the community asset be opened.
The campaign led to a meeting between the city’s parks and recreation personnel, residents and their councilmember, Austin Davis.
After I spoke to Davis in early July, shortly after the meeting was held, he said, “My understanding of Greenwood Pool is there's a cracked water pipe that if they wanted to fill the pool today, they couldn't."
But Davis and residents said during that meeting that the city promised to make repairs and get the pool open again soon.
When I visited the pool Monday afternoon, it was filled with water. There wasn’t anyone swimming, likely due to storms earlier in the day, but neighborhood resident Brian Kelly said the city did the right thing by fixing the pool and getting it opened.
"It was just, for the neighborhood, a little disappointing that they didn't want to fix it and just decided, at least the narrative on the outside is that they just decided to shut it down, instead of fixing it,” Kelly said. “Then I kind of saw them come out finally after the neighborhood rallied, and I mean, they probably weren't out here for two hours, and it was already fixed, so it's a little disappointing that that's all it was. And it's been open for not even a week now, and I've been kind of glancing out, and there's people here like crazy, like lots of people.”
He said the pool is a community asset and he hopes it remains functioning and open for all to enjoy.
"We bought here just a couple years ago, and it’s very cool to say that you live across from a city park that has a pool and courts,” Kelly said. “So yeah, it's absolutely an amenity.”
Damon Maloney is a Cuyahoga County and We Follow Through anchor at News 5 Cleveland. Follow him on X @DMaloneyTV, on Facebook DamonMaloneyTV or email him at Damon.Maloney@wews.com.
