Norwich can't find lifeguards; Spaulding Pond remains closed to swimming
Norwich — One month after the City Council approved a budget that restored $38,400 in funding for lifeguards to open Spaulding Pond for summer swimming, no lifeguards are on duty and the beach remains closed.
City Manager John Salomone said Tuesday the city not only has been unsuccessful in hiring the four lifeguards needed to open the beach full time, it hasn’t recruited even the two lifeguards needed to open the beach part time. Two lifeguards are needed each day, he said, to allow for breaks without interrupting swimming.
Salomone said the city has advertised in local newspapers, reached out to YMCAs in the area, asked the Norwich Free Academy swim team and approached other municipalities with town beaches to ask if their lifeguards are looking for more hours. All to no avail.
Salomone said Norwich offered to train interested people to become certified lifeguards. He said the city contacted the local Red Cross to see if the agency was running training classes. It is, but the enrollees already are hired by someone else, Salomone said.
“I was surprised we couldn’t get them,” Salomone said. “A lot of them go from year to year in the same place. We didn’t have a lot of legacies. There are a lot of waterfront parks around here, with the lakes and the beaches. If people have suggestions, I’d be glad to hear them. We can’t just do it with volunteers there. We have to make sure people are qualified.”
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