GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ) – Green Bay Alderman Chris Wery is speaking out after the city council voted to uphold Mayor Jim Schmitt’s veto of the Colburn Park Pool project.
The council voted Tuesday 6-to-6 on whether to support Schmitt’s veto. The council would have needed eight votes to override the veto.
So, is the pool issue at Colburn Park a dead one?
“The Olympic sized pool that the community wanted and that we raised a million dollars on and that the city council basically promised, is dead at the mayor’s hands,” says Wery. “The mayor has pretty much been ‘my way or the highway’ and it’s been that way on this issue. So, it will be interesting to see what he comes up with.”
Wery doubts the Friends of Colburn Pool will be satisfied with a smaller vision.
“Several people, especially some of the larger donors, have said they want their money back and they won’t pay the rest of it. I think when all is said and done you might have less than half of the million dollars really to go toward a smaller pool.”
Mayor Schmitt has said the city is willing to work toward building some sort of pool at Colburn.
The cost of rebuilding the Olympic-sized pool is $6.8 million; that’s $2.3 million more than what the council had originally budgeted for the project.
That difference kept a handful of council members from supporting the project.
