Why Aren’t There More Public Pools in California?

KQED's Forum

KQED

Politics, News, News Commentary

4.6 • 656 Ratings

🗓️ 8 August 2023

⏱️ 56 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Public pools serve as community gathering spaces, havens from the heat and safe and affordable places for people to learn to swim. But public pools in the United States have become increasingly rare over the past century. That’s limited the ability of people of color and those without access to country clubs or backyard pools to learn safely. And it may also be one reason why only 56% of U.S. residents can demonstrate basic swimming skills, according to an American Red Cross poll. We look at the history of public pools in the U.S. and here in California, what’s behind their decline and the racial disparities in drowning rates that persist. Guests: Laurie Davies, California assembly memeber, represents parts of Orange and San Diego Counties Jennifer Lopez, founder, Echo Aquatics - an organization that offers adult and child swim lessons and water sport coaching Heather McGhee, author, "The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together" - former president, Demos, a public policy think tank; board chair, Color of Change, the nation’s largest online racial justice organization Patt Morrison, columnist, The Los Angeles Times Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Support for Forum comes from Rancho La Puerta, a wellness resort in Baja, California, just an hour from San Diego,
0:07.4	recently voted the number one destination spa by readers of travel and leisure magazine.
0:12.8	Summer retreat packages of three, four, or seven nights including hiking, water classes, mindfulness,
0:19.9	spa therapies, and culinary adventures with
0:22.8	farm-fresh ingredients. Learn more at Rancho LaPuerta.com.
0:27.3	Switch to Comcast Business Mobile and save hundreds a year in your wireless bill.
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0:36.0	Compar as two unlimited intro lines and lowest price 5D plans of top three carriers. Tax on fees extra, reduce speeds after 30 gigabytes of usage. Data thresholds may vary. From KQED in San Francisco, this is Forum. I'm Mina Kim. Public swimming pools serve as community
1:07.3	gathering spaces, havens from the heat in the summer months, and safe and affordable
1:11.9	places for people to learn to swim. But public pools in the U.S. have become increasingly rare
1:17.3	over the past century, and it may be one reason only about half of Americans know basic
1:22.4	swimming skills, according to the American Red Cross, or why drowning remains one of the leading causes of death among children.
1:30.3	This hour, we look at what drove the decline of the public pool and the rise of the private backyard pool,
1:36.7	especially in California. Join us.
1:48.8	Welcome to Forum. I'm Mina Kim.
1:54.0	The United States is, for a majority of its citizens, a swimming desert.
1:57.6	That's what a recent New York Times op-ed by Maragay declared.
2:02.6	Too many people don't have access to safe places to swim or to learn how to swim.
2:04.9	And we are all suffering for it.
2:08.8	Drowning is the leading cause of death among one to four-year-olds.
2:14.1	And it's the second leading cause of accidental death among five to 14-year-olds, with black children three times more likely to drown than their white peers.
	...

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