Today is the last day that the city of Birmingham’s three pools will be open as the school year begins for kids.

Despite high temperatures of heat, Birmingham’s Park and Recreation director Ronald Hicks said the pools are closing for the summer because most of the lifeguards are high school and college students with prior obligations. But he doesn’t expect that to be the case next summer. “We are working on a solid plan to open more pools with longer open dates for the upcoming year,” Hicks said.

During summer 2023, pools were open six days a week, costing only $1 for admission (not limited to city of Birmingham residents). However, the limited pool access was due to an ongoing issue: A lifeguard shortage.

According to an interview with NPR, Bernard J. Fisher II, director of health and safety at the American Lifeguard Association, said the COVID-19 pandemic caused a ripple effect on people not getting trained, certifications expiring and people choosing higher paying jobs.

Birmingham’s Parks and Rec director Hicks said the pools at Memorial, Crestwood and MLK Recreation Centers were the only ones open and operating this summer. “Six certified lifeguards have to be on duty at a rec center facility in order for the pools to be open,” Hicks said.

He said the pools still faced lifeguard shortage despite Mayor Woodfin’s call out to get more lifeguards and announced a pay increase to $15.15. But that didn’t make a difference.

Hicks also said some pool locations aren’t open because there may not be a demand in some neighborhoods. “For example, Roosevelt City, if we only have three people who come to the pool, it costs us more money for staff to be there,” he said.

When asked about unused pool locations closing permanently in the future, Hicks did not provide a comment.

But he noted, for the most part, there’s a demand for pools to be open. Although they’ve had a handful of lifeguards complete training, he said some guards fail drug tests or don’t feel comfortable going into certain neighborhoods. Hicks said security is offered at some of the pool locations based on a high volume of vandalism and truancy.

To combat this issue, the city of Birmingham worked with the YMCA’s lifeguard training program, as part of their goal of hiring 1,500 guards to address the shortage. According to Hicks, once the Y finished filling in the gaps of their own shortage, they sent remaining lifeguards throughout the greater Birmingham community, and specifically to the city of Birmingham’s park and recreation department.

Jude Dooley, senior vice president at the Greater Birmingham YMCA, said they trained more than 800 lifeguards through their program, but only needed to hire 80 for their various Y locations. He said the other lifeguards worked at pools in other communities and country clubs. But he thinks another issue is cause for concern.

“There’s a need for swim lessons for kids and adults in Birmingham,” Dooley said. “The community is faced with people who are not confident swimmers. And when we’re trying to identify people that live in the community to keep the pool safe, we just don’t have access to adults who feel confident in the water.”

Dooley said that only a very small percentage of the lifeguards who completed the training actually live in Birmingham. Most of the people who finished live in Over the Mountain communities, but the Y is planning to do something about that.

“We are offering swim lessons at the Downtown Youth Center YMCA. We also bring kids from the Northeast YMCA for lessons at the Youth Center,” said Dooley.

Dooley said the YMCA is not done with its training program. The Y is still aiming for a total of 1,500 lifeguards by the end of 2023 with preparations to launch water safety classes in 2024.

The city of Birmingham is doing something similar. Ronald Hicks said the Park and Rec department is preparing for free lifeguard training classes that will be held at the East Pinson Valley location starting as early as September. The program will last for a year.