Excitement is building for the improvements made to the Mount Vernon City Pool, as workers have started installing items like the new slides around the deck of the pool.

“We’ve had kids outside the pool staring in from the fence the last couple weeks watching the crew from Woodruff working and installing the new slides,” said city administrator Chris Nosbisch.

Nosbisch said that the repairs made to the basin and deck should extend the life of the pool for another 10 years or more, which would allow the city to tackle some other projects.

“They’ve done such an excellent job sealing the cracks we had in the basin, we’re hoping that will eliminate some of the loss of water we see in the pool,” Nosbisch said.

Aside from the new slides, decking and basin repairs, there have also been some repairs to buildings around the pool as well, including updating the bathrooms/shower rooms.

Workers will begin on siding of the buildings down at the pool this week.

The city also purchased new deck chairs and picnic tables for the pool. The purchase order for deck chairs was to increase them from 20 to roughly 50 around the pool.

“We increased the size of the deck around the pool in some areas, so we have some more room for additional chairs,” said Matt Siders, parks and recreation director.

The deck chairs come with a 5-year warranty, while the tables come with a 20-year warranty.

“With these chairs, if something like a strap were to break on them, we can look at repairing that,” Nosbisch said. “They have longer warranties, are made of quality materials and have a better look at the pool.”

Council member Paul Tuerler said that the improvements to the pool speak to the leadership recognizing that doing continued patches to the infrastructure of the pool was not doing the pool’s life any favors.

“Nothing against our city crews who do a lot of work, but the improvements and work there was not their expertise, and stepping back and bringing in the right people for the job benefits the pool,” Tuerler said. “It’s going to be worth it in the long term.”