It's summertime in North Texas and for many of the children in the Kidd Springs neighborhood of North Oak Cliff, that means becoming a member of the Kidd Springs Sailfish swim team.
"We really didn't have anything over in this area, and in my research I figured out that the city would provide a swim team for us and all I needed to do was coordinate it," said Becky Moffett, coordinator of the Sailfish swim team.
The swim team is just one among several programs at the Kidd Springs community pool and park, and it has about 130-140 neighborhood children on the team with a growing waiting list.
"I cannot imagine Kidd Springs without a pool," said parent Jennifer Fawks.
The community faces the possibility of its pool closing as the City of Dallas Aquatics Services undergoes an overhaul of its master plan. City staff members will pick which city pools will get money for major upgrades and which ones will be shut down.
"There's going to be a lot of criteria, including the size of the site, room for parking, what other amenities the park might have, adjacency to other roads, public transportation," said Robin Steinshnider, Aquatics Services manager.
No pool is off-limits, which is why when Sailfish team members promoted their upcoming swim-a-thon fundraiser scheduled for Saturday, they raised $10,000 in two weeks.
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"My kids, who are 8 and 6, sat at our dining room table and addressed all the envelopes and stamped them to get support for the swim-a-thon, to let city hall know we value this and we value it so much, we are willing to get cramps in our little hands in order to write all these letters out," said parent Mary Flickner.
The team will use the donations for small upgrades to the pool, but they hope the city will see that they're invested into keeping Kidd Springs Pool afloat for generations of swimmers to come.
"We don't know what's going to happen with it yet, but we're being proactive and say, 'We're here, we don't want our pool to go away and we want to help in any ways possible,' to keep it open for another 25 years," said Moffett.
