Title
Recommendation to Approve the City Aquatic Center Project and the Recommended Funding Plan for a Total Project Cost of $35.5 Million. The City of Alameda has prepared an Addendum to a Mitigated Negative Declaration pursuant to Section 15164 of the California Environmental Quality Act Guidelines and no further environmental review is required. (Recreation 10051400)
Body
To: Honorable Mayor and Members of the City Council
From: Jennifer Ott, City Manager
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The City of Alameda (City) Aquatic Center (Aquatic Center) project includes a 30-meter competition pool, an activity pool, and supporting mechanical and administrative offices. The project has experienced increased costs of $5.5 million over the original $30 million budget due to a convergence of economic and site-specific challenges. This additional cost was included in the Fiscal Year (FY) 2025-27 Biennial Budget and while costs increased beyond original estimates, these investments are necessary to ensure the project's safety, resilience, sustainability, and long-term success to provide significant public benefits to the Alameda community.
BACKGROUND
The Aquatic Center, located on the west side of Sweeney Park Open Space Park (Jean Sweeney), will provide critical additional pool space to meet the increasing and unmet community needs for competitive and recreational aquatic programs. The City’s community aquatic programs are currently held at the two swim centers at Alameda High School and Encinal High School through a Joint Use Agreement with the Alameda Unified School District (AUSD). However, these pools do not provide sufficient space to meet all community needs for youth and adult swim and water polo teams, lap swim, aqua fitness, summer camps and year-round swimming lessons. Since 2020, the Alameda Recreation and Parks Department (ARPD) has provided year-round programs with significantly increased participation numbers and continued waitlists that highlight the limitations of sharing the AUSD pools. The Aquatic Center will support over 40,000 swim lessons annually and help meet ARPD’s goal of giving all residents access to water safety programs and learning the lifelong skill of swimming.
In 2022, an extensive community and site feasibility process was conducted to determine an appropriate location for an aquatic center. Jean Sweeney was identified and approved by City Council as the project site. The site was chosen due to its central location within the City, proximity to public transportation, promotion of West End economic development as it is within walking distance of restaurants and shopping at Webster Street and Marina Village, being easily accessible by bicycles and pedestrians along the Cross Alameda Trail, as well as an equity perspective of being walking distance from three Alameda Housing Authority sites. The Aquatic Center provides significant community benefit with recreational and competitive aquatic activities for adults, seniors, children and families. In addition, the Sweeney Park community garden will be constructed as part of this project, funded by separate monies from the Park Maintenance budget.
In 2024, ARPD conducted an extensive community engagement process that included five community meetings and three citywide surveys with over five thousand combined responses. Detailed information and results are available at <https://www.alamedaca.gov/Departments/Recreation-Parks/Alameda-Aquatic-Center>
On September 12, 2024, City Council approved a design concept for the Aquatic Center with a 30-meter pool and activity pool and provided direction on additional design features such as Lobby, Diving Well and Springboards, Community Room, Building Storage, and Building Electrification, all of which required further consideration for feasibility.
On June 23, 2025, the Planning Board adopted an addendum to the Jean Sweeney Open Space Park Mitigated Negative Declaration (MND) and held a public hearing for Design Review and Use Permit for the Aquatic Center project.
DISCUSSION
The scope for the Aquatic Center includes a 30-meter competition pool, an activity pool with three swim lanes, supporting mechanical and locker rooms, parking lot, bike parking, Electric Vehicle (EV) chargers, entry plaza and administrative and registration offices. Throughout numerous community meetings and surveys on project design, residents consistently prioritized maximizing the amount of water space over other amenities.
The Aquatic Center, as with all large project design processes, underwent extensive soil, geotechnical and other technical studies of the site to understand the engineering requirements necessary to build this specific facility type that will serve the community for decades. The original budget for the Center was $30 million in 2022 when City Council approved funding up to 50% from unassigned residual fund balance and 50% from the sale of bonds. Since the original budget was established, these additional studies and cost estimates, based on current Bay Area construction costs, revealed information and associated costs not yet identified when the budget was established. An aquatic center is a highly specialized facility with a specific level of design and engineering required to protect the integrity of the facility for years to come. It is common practice to conduct these technical studies during the schematic design of a facility which further refines both the design and cost estimates from the original high-level assumptions.
In January 2025, the schematic design cost estimate was completed and the associated cost estimate totaled $42 million, significantly higher than the established budget. The design team, including City staff, then refined the design to reduce costs while using the community’s priority of maximizing water space as the design framework. The design team ensured the pool sizes were not reduced and instead identified and evaluated other design elements to value engineer or completely remove from the project to reduce overall project costs.
The primary modifications include the following:
1) Removal of the outdoor pavilion.
2) Re-orientation of the activity pool reducing the surrounding deck footprint but maintaining the pool size.
3) Removal of 20 parking spaces.
4) Replaced building façade materials.
5) Reduced the size of the administrative building.
6) Reduced the depth of the pool from 10 feet to 7 feet.
7) Reduced the height of both buildings.
8) Replaced wind wall materials.
The current design is detailed in Exhibit 1 and these design modifications reduced the estimated cost to $35.5 million. The $5.5 million over the original City Council approved budget of $30 million is due to four key factors that are either based on City Council direction or are essential for the construction of the Aquatic Center. The key factors include soil improvements to address potential liquefaction, groundwater abatement, electrification of the Aquatic Center, and economic uncertainty and rising construction costs.
Alameda has challenging soil and groundwater conditions for all construction projects in the City. The geotechnical report revealed the Aquatic Center site is subject to liquefaction to a depth of 35 feet. Without significant design elements to address the soils, the pools would likely shift more than 3 inches, rendering the pool drainage and filtration system unusable, as regulated by the Alameda County Health Department. The Aquatic Center would then be closed until repairs were made to fix the issues created by this settlement. To minimize the extent of damage from a 7.8 earthquake, the structural engineer recommended stabilizing the soil to a depth of 35 feet under the buildings and both pools. Staff evaluated and compared these soil improvement costs to the estimated costs to repair the drainage and filtration system. The total cost of soil stabilization is approximately $1.6 million. The estimated repair costs to fix the entire deck, drainage and filtration system is $3 million - $4 million, significantly more than the cost to prevent the facility settlement in addition to the facility being closed for a significant time to make the repairs.
The groundwater report identified that the groundwater ranges between 3 feet to 5 feet below the surface throughout the project site. Since the pool maximum depths range from 5 feet in the activity pool to 7 feet in the competition pool, engineering solutions were required to address hydrostatic pressure when the pools are drained for repairs and maintenance, meaning that the pools would “pop” out of the ground and be rendered useless without the weight of the water to counter the groundwater pressure. The two options included a thickened pool foundation estimated at $500,000 or installation of a dewatering system to pump groundwater away from the pools estimated at $300,000. The engineers recommended the installation of dewatering systems for a variety of reasons, including a lower project cost.
In September 2024, City Council provided climate forward direction to fully electrify the Aquatic Center, including the pool heating system. The Aquatic Center will be one of only a handful of fully electric public swim centers in the state and this electrification also greatly reduces greenhouse gases, supporting the City’s Climate Action and Resiliency Plan (CARP). ARPD partnered with Alameda Municipal Power (AMP) to assist in the design and plans to make the facility a demonstration project with the support of the Public Utilities Commission (PUB). This includes an educational component with signage to educate the community about electrification. The full electrification, rather than a traditional gas system, added approximately $1 million to the total project cost.
Due to the complexities of the site and overall economic volatility of the construction industry, the project team is including a significant, conservative amount of contingencies and construction escalation costs. Construction escalation of 4% and a construction contingency of 10% accounts for approximately $4.25 million of the total project budget. These contingencies are included to address unknown factors and lower the risk for additional cost.
While the total cost of $35.5 million is higher than originally anticipated, the Aquatic Center, as designed, will be resilient to seismic and groundwater conditions, operate with energy efficiency and reduce emissions, and meet the community’s needs for additional water space. The Aquatic Center will provide significant public benefit with sufficient pool space to meet all community aquatic needs for youth and adults as well as necessary water space to meet the community’s goals of providing water safety for all residents.
ALTERNATIVES
• Approve the staff recommendation for approval of the City Aquatic Center project and the funding plan with a new project cost of $35.5 million.
• Recommend staff reduce pool size and project design elements to meet the original budget of $30 million.
• Recommend stop work on the on the City Aquatic Center project until other funding sources are available.
FINANCIAL IMPACT
Funds are available for Capital Improvement Project No. C55400 New City Aquatic Center totaling $30 million, inclusive of $15 million use of Residual General Fund balance and $15 million of bond proceeds.
|
Electrification |
$1 million |
|
Geotechnical Ground Improvement |
$2.3 million |
|
Construction Escalation |
$1.7 million |
|
Gound Water -pool uplift |
$.50 million |
|
Total Estimated Additional Cost |
$5.5 million |
Additional Cost Breakdown Includes:
The adjusted estimated total project cost is $35.5 million. Economic uncertainty and rising construction costs are included in the total estimated project cost.
The adopted FY 2025-27 budget included $4.5 million for the Aquatic Center while preserving the $9 million Residual General Fund Balance. Other funding sources include revenue from the bond proceeds of $1.1 million. The total available funding for the City Aquatic Center is $35.6 million.
MUNICIPAL CODE/POLICY DOCUMENT CROSS REFERENCE
This action is consistent with the Alameda Municipal Code Section 2-61.8 related to Design-Build. The 2023-2026 City Council Strategic Plan identifies the City Aquatic Center under the Priority to Enhance community Safety and Services Project CS10 to Design and Construct the City Aquatic Center. This action is subject to the Levine Act.
ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW
In July 2014, City Council by Resolution No. 14955 adopted the Jean Sweeney Open Space Park MND and Mitigation Measures in compliance with California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). In accordance with Section 15164 of the CEQA Guidelines, an Addendum to the MND has been prepared in the manner required by and as authorized under CEQA. As part of the Addendum analysis, a transportation analysis was conducted by Fehr & Peers and determined the new aquatic center is considered a local serving use and presumed to have a less than significant impact on Vehicle Miles Traveled to the surrounding area. In addition, a Noise & Vibration Assessment conducted by Illingworth & Rodkin, Inc. determined that the project meets City, state, and county noise level requirements and would have a less than significant impact to surrounding properties. On June 23, 2025 at a regular hearing, the Planning Board considered the Addendum, along with the 2014 MND and Mitigation Measures, prior to making a decision on the Use Permit & Design Review, which was heard at the same time. The Addendum and conditions of approval for the planning entitlements incorporate and will require compliance with all applicable mitigation measures from the 2014 MND. Accordingly, the Aquatic Center project does not raise important new issues about potentially significant impacts on the environment that have not been previously disclosed in the MND, and no further environmental review is required (Exhibit 2).
CLIMATE IMPACT
All buildings associated with the Aquatic Center will meet a minimum LEED Silver certification pursuant to the City’s building ordinance. The Aquatic Center will be fully electric and incorporate water efficient fixtures and landscaping to reduce water use supporting the CARP.
RECOMMENDATION
Approve the City Aquatic Center project and the recommended funding plan for a total project cost of $35.5 million.
Respectfully submitted,
Justin Long, Recreation and Parks Director
Financial Impact section reviewed,
Ross McCarthy, Finance Director
Exhibits:
1. Exhibit 1 - Design Development Update
2. Exhibit 2 - Amended Modified Negative Declaration CEQA