AKRON, Ohio — For 60 years, the Eastwood Swim Club, also known as Eastwood Swim Park, entertained families and provided a fun place to cool off.
However, the park—operated by the Walker family—closed in 2014.
Fast forward to 2026, and the owners have a new idea: turning the property in Akron's Goodyear Heights neighborhood into a tactical training facility for police, firefighters and military members.
If you peek over a fence on Eastwood Avenue, you can still see the giant slide and the shell of the pool.
Renderings provided to city officials show how part of the 12-acre property could be turned into a 3,840-square-foot facility that would include a three-story structure.
While the property is in Akron, it's very close to the Tallmadge border.
Several Tallmadge residents, including Paula Kiel, have spoken out and signed a petition against the proposal.
Kiel is concerned that the training center would create noise and traffic problems and drive down property values.
"It looks like a military base, like a boot camp," she said. "I don't like the aesthetics. I don't like the general feel of it. It's not like our quiet community that we have here."
Goodyear Heights Metro Park sits next to the old pool site. In a statement, Lindsay Smith, a spokesperson for Summit Metro Parks, shared some concerns.
"We have great concerns that a training facility that involves potential noise and other disruptions adjacent to Goodyear Heights Metro Park would impact our ability to offer a meaningful park experience to our visitors," Smith said.
Rob Walker told News 5 that law enforcement officers would not use live ammunition, and there would not be a traditional gun range, a point that Walker's family attorney, Mark Salerno, stressed to Akron City Council members during a meeting in March.
"It's not a shooting range. It's controlled environment inside and they have simulated plastic rounds. They're no louder than a lawnmower," Salerno said.
Walker said training would be led by licensed professionals and by current active-duty first responders.
Walker issued the following statement about the matter:
We realized the water park and swimming pool businesses is not what it used to be in today's time. 95% of privately owned swim parks are non-existent, most are city or tax payer funded. We wanted to provide a service to our community in another way, as our family did for many years. After a lot of research and time invested in networking and meeting individuals in the industry, we figured what better way than to provide our law enforcement officers, emergency medical services, and firefighters who risk their lives every day with the best facility to have real world training? With also providing facilities and attractions for our citizens. As a regular citizen I would like to have the peace of mind to know that these service members have the best resources and best training possible, not only for performance but also for public safety and individual safety.
Inside the center of the pool, below ground level we will have a multi-story, SOUND PROOF, professional facility built by a well-known company in the industry. It will be painted very non intrusive, far less than existing structures on the property. All training will be done inside the facility and will be inaudible to the residents across Eastwood Avenue, as well as individuals utilizing the surrounding Metro Parks area.
A large, and fair misconception is that the law enforcement officers will train using real live ammunition. This is NOT the case. We will only allow simunition training cartridges, as an industry standard for training on our property. These are a simple cartridge that will project a NON-LETHAL and eco friendly plastic projectile that leaves a small paint or wax marker on impact. For these training cartridges to operate, they must swap a separate part out of their fire-arm. The way this part is engineered and physically unable to fire a real live ammunition, increasing the safety for themselves and everyone around, no hearing dampening devices are necessary.
Another misconception is this will not be a traditional gun range where you have 10's of people lining up to fire their weapons at a very rapid pace. They will perform their training inside the facility, the training will be led by licensed professionals and current active duty first responders. At most during a live-action simulation training scenario which could last 20 minutes for one scenario there would only be one, two, or three cartridges used. A lot of times they won't fire any shots based on a specific training scenario, if they were able to disengage, or deescalate during a training scenario.
Our vision ultimately is to provide a first-class defense education and training facility for all first responders, as well as a defense education facility for civilians who have interest in training and education. We plan to have a classroom available and television monitors for training to be used by license instructors. We would also like to see an archery range for local citizens who have a passion for the sport. We also have envisioned a first responder style training course similar to, a CrossFit course for general training as well as public events. Possible local iron man competitions for civilians as well as first responders, charity events could be incorporated into these as well.
We believe this is needed, and would bring a lot of excellent value and engagement to not only our communities first responders but it to our citizens as well. If our permit is granted we would like to begin breaking ground with our partnership companies very quickly.
The idea has also gained support from Ben Stasic, the deputy fire chief for the Tallmadge Fire Department. He also testified before the Akron City Council last month.
"Training facilities are difficult to come by, especially for the city the size of Tallmadge, or smaller," Stasic said.
Akron City Councilwoman Sharon Connor said she had initial concerns about the proposed project, but after meeting with the owners, she supports the idea and doesn't believe noise inside the facility will disrupt the neighborhood.
"Outside noise may come from an obstacle course, may come from an archery range, but that's not even a third of the volume that you had when it was a pool," Connor said.
However, Connor understands there will be continued pushback like the sentiments Akron resident Nicole Husty shared with the council in March.
"This is not something I'm comfortable with across the street, directly across the street from us," Husty said.
The Planning Commission voted 3-1 to approve a zoning change in February. Ultimately, it will fall to the Akron City Council to schedule a hearing before voting on the permit.
Connor isn't sure when that will happen and said it could depend on any new plans the Walker family provides.
"Are they going to modify it? Are they going to leave it as it is? Are there going to be some changes to that? And then, we can move forward," she said.
