Some members of the Secaucus Town Council were a little surprised last week to discover that Hoboken residents – children and adults – have been approved to join the Secaucus Swimming Pool.
Last week, Hoboken City Councilman Peter Cunningham wrote a letter to his constituents in which he stated, “Effective immediately, Hoboken residents have the privilege to use the outdoor Secaucus Pool at a reduced ‘interlocal’ rate.”
Members of the Town Council had approved these interlocal rates for Hoboken residents in a conference call on June 10.
“I thought we approved memberships for kids only. I didn’t think this included adults, too,” said Town Councilman Michael Gonnelli after Cunningham’s letter was posted on www.hudsonreporter.com.
Town Administrator David Drumeler, however, said there’s nothing new about such interlocal agreements.
“We’ve always had different membership rates. There’s a membership rate for residents, a membership rate for non-residents, then we have this interlocal rate. Both Hoboken and Nutley asked us to extend interlocal status to their residents. We offer this rate if they don’t have a town pool of their own, and if we have some history with the [out-of-town] residents using our pool and being well-behaved. North Bergen used to get this interlocal rate, then they built their town pool, so we don’t extend interlocal status to them now. Hoboken utilizes [the pool] quite a bit. It didn’t seem like that big of a deal.”
Drumeler emphasized the various out-of-town membership rates apply to the Secaucus Swimming Pool only and are not applicable to the new Recreation Center across the street from the pool.