photo by: City of Lawrence

This rendering shows the basic "preferred concept" design for the proposed renovation to the Outdoor Aquatic Center. The City Commission is scheduled to vote on a design on Tuesday night .

The Lawrence City Commission voted to approve the “preferred concept” design for a major renovation of the Outdoor Aquatic Center that falls in line with the $6.1 million budget but decreases the current recreation area.

The commission approved the design 4-1, along with a motion from Commissioner Brad Finkeldei that added an additional accessibility ramp along with some other staff requests. Commissioner Lisa Larsen was the lone vote against approving the concept.

The selected renovation concept will keep the existing deep dive pool, a 25-meter section of the lap pool and the water slide and plunge pool on the complex’s west side. The bathhouse will also be renovated, with a focus on upgrading the drainage of the space and increasing privacy features. The design includes additional features like a lazy river, splash pad and shallow pool.

The approved design will have a total of about 16,000 square feet of pool area, about a 3,000-square-foot reduction from the current size.

The commissioners were presented with three designs and voted for the cheapest option. Two other designs — one which would have cost around $7.3 million, the other $8.5 million — would have added more features to the basic concept. The more expensive designs were added in response to public feedback about what residents would add if there were a larger budget, said Mark Hecker, the assistant director for the parks division.

One of the questions commissioners asked the city staff and members of the firm helping design the renovation was about the reduction of the lap pool from 50 meters to 25 meters.

Luis Ruiz, the Parks and Recreation Department director, told commissioners they explored keeping that pool at 50 meters, but it would have cost “a lot more money.” Ruiz also said the city had an indoor 50-meter pool, and representatives from Haskell Indian Nations University reached out about the city potentially using its 50-meter pool.

Vice Mayor Mike Dever was concerned about the potential cost of the project, as were several public commenters who spoke about it. Dever wondered whether there was a way for the city to provide an estimate, before any contracts were signed, of the cost of fixing the current pool as opposed to doing the proposed renovation.

Finkeldei said he wanted to leave open the chance for construction firms to provide alternative bids for additional aspects, like another slide or extra shade. He said since bids can come in above or below budget, it would be good to see how many of the extra items could possibly be added, but that that couldn’t happen until designs started being drawn up.

“We won’t know any of (the true costs) until we approve a concept,” Finkeldei said.

Jake Baldwin, a engineering program manager with the Municipal Services and Operations department, said the plan would be to have bids for construction ready around April 2025, with construction planned for “midsummer 2025” so the aquatic center would be ready for the 2026 season. Ruiz said the department’s goal for that timeline was to not have a whole summer without a pool.

In other business, the commission:

• Awarded a $161,980 bid to Infrastructure Solutions LLC for the Johnson Avenue storm sewer improvement project.

The project will add a new enclosed storm sewer system from the west side of Learnard Avenue to Burroughs Creek. The city memo said that previously, rain runoff from city streets and ditches would be drained through several backyards without proper drainage easements or infrastructure.

The city requests authorization for a contract total of $178,155.40 to allow contingency funds for the project. All of those funds were previously allocated for the project.