Q&A
Parks Department's plans for improving water safety in future seasons
0:47:02
·
97 sec
Commissioner Donoghue outlines the Parks Department's plans for improving water safety in future seasons, focusing on recruitment efforts and infrastructure improvements.
- Preparation for the 2025 season already underway, including recruitment planning
- Request for council members to help with new lifeguard recruits
- Plans for enhancing 39 existing pool facilities
- Construction of two new pools at Shirley Chisholm and Roy Wilkins Park
- Additional $46 million investment from Governor Hochul for pool improvements across the city
Shekar Krishnan
0:47:02
Thank you.
0:47:03
And aside from trying to increase the number of lifeguards, letting New Yorkers know where they can and can't swim.
0:47:11
What ideas?
0:47:13
What affirmative ideas have been pursued by this administration to ensure that a summer like the one we just had does not occur again in terms of the loss of life at beaches.
Sue Donoghue
0:47:26
Thank you for the questions.
0:47:27
So as I said in my testimony, we are already preparing for the 2025 season.
0:47:34
We're already starting to think about recruitment, already starting to plan for the qualifying tasks, already looking at how we're gonna be communicating and bringing in more young people.
0:47:44
As I said in my testimony, we're also tasking the council to help us with new recruits.
0:47:49
We're hoping that the council will each send us 10 new recruits who are qualifying.
0:47:54
So we know that it's critical that connection between having enough lifeguards to man our pools and beaches.
0:48:00
We're doing everything in our power to increase that.
0:48:03
We also, as I said in my testimony, we are moving forward on a number of projects to enhance our both existing facilities, 39 pools.
0:48:12
We'll have enhancements to infrastructure.
0:48:13
We're building 2 new pools.
0:48:16
At Shirley Chisholm and at Roy Wilkins Park.
0:48:18
And then we were thrilled with the New York Swim's funding from Governor Hochol, an additional $46,000,000 investment in pools across the city.
0:48:28
So huge amount of money and investment in enhancing our swim infrastructure and then a real focus on enhancing our recruitment.
0:48:37
We've seen gains each year and we expect that to continue.
