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How a jar of salsa led to a costly pool cleanup in Needham
Draining, cleaning, and refilling the pool could cost the town somewhere in the vicinity of $15,000 to $20,000, according to the Needham Observer.
Needham officials were forced to close and drain a popular lap pool this week after a jar of salsa reportedly shattered poolside, sending glass shards into the water.
The incident happened July 14, shuttering the lap pool at the Rosemary Recreation Complex for several days amid an ongoing heat wave, according to the town’s Park and Recreation department. In a post on Facebook, Park and Recreation Director Stacey Mulroy said the pool needed to be drained and cleaned, chemically rebalanced, and tested for bacteria before it could reopen to the public.
“All these steps take some time,” Mulroy wrote on Sunday. “We are unsure of the exact number of days it will take us to reopen the pool.”
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In the meantime, some water activities continued as scheduled in the complex’s separate family pool, according to the post.
“As a reminder — there is absolutely NO GLASS of any kind allowed anywhere at the Rosemary Pools,” Mulroy wrote. “Today’s incident was avoidable and unfortunate.”
According to local news site the Needham Observer, the culprit was a broken jar of salsa, and the pool cleanup could cost the town somewhere in the vicinity of $15,000 to $20,000 once staff labor, overtime, and pool chemicals are factored in.
Mulroy told the Observer the clear glass shards can float undetected in the water, posing a risk to swimmers and necessitating a heavy duty cleanup.
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“They can float into somebody’s eye or somebody’s mouth or into their lungs if they ingest shards of glass,” Mulroy told the news outlet. “That is a more concerning situation, which is why we go through this very specific procedure.”
The lap pool reopened late Thursday afternoon, Needham Park and Recreation confirmed on Facebook.
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