The City of Mexico’s Parks and Recreation Director Chad Shoemaker announced Friday that due to supply line issues with China and the issues getting fiberglass resin, the planned Fairground …
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The City of Mexico’s Parks and Recreation Director Chad Shoemaker announced Friday that due to supply line issues with China and the issues getting fiberglass resin, the planned Fairground Aquatic Center expansion will not be completed until 2023.
The hoped-for expansion was to be the addition of water slides at the aquatic center, 1200 Adams Street, that would consist of two of the items to accommodate multiple-age groups, physical ability, space needs and space preference.
Shoemaker said that now the city will kick off its fundraising efforts in October.
“We do traditional fundraising where will be making asks of individuals, going to foundations,” Shoemaker said. “The only public side you will see – this will allow us to put out fundraising materials at the pool next year.
“But most of the fundraising efforts will be private.”
Shoemaker said the project was put in place for the FY2022-23 city budget.
The estimated cost was $600,000 including $274,000 for two fiberglass slides, $101,000 for site costs, $103,000 for the tower and $96,000 for plumbing and mechanical equipment.
The City of Mexico has committed $200,000 to this addition at the center.
“We got into a position (this month) where we were starting to hear from suppliers that there is probably a problem coming,” Shoemaker said. “We couldn’t put out the contracts until we got the new budget approved. It’s kind of how things are right now.
“Everything is hard to buy and build right now. We always pride ourselves on coming in on budget on items and following through on policies. But, right now, it’s tough to get things bought at all.”
Shoemaker said his hope would be to start fundraising and put the project under contract in the next month or two.
“The problem is we aren’t going to have live pricing on the thing until six or seven months out because people won’t do that more than three to six mounts out on anything,” Shoemaker said, noting he understands this policy. “It makes it difficult to get anything done.”
The fundraising process will be discussed in early October and Shoemaker hopes to update the city on the direction they hope to go.
Shoemaker said that the company they were going to work with was North American, but most buy their basic building materials from China.
“You can’t buy a lot of this stuff from the U.S. anymore,” he said. “The COVID disruptions … the shipping disruptions … and now we are hearing one of the rivers have dried up and it has no hydro-electric from some of the factories.”
