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Stop Picking on Pools, Joe!

Posted by Dick Wolfe on March 18, 2009 at 8:10am in Business Growth, Expansion, and Current Opportunit
Hi Fellow Geniuses,You may have seen the significant pick-up of an AP article written Monday in which Vice President Biden was quoted as saying “no swimming pools in this money” when hinting of the administrations’ stipulations on the federal stimulus package now going out to states and municipalities.It was one thing when swimming pools were specifically named in the Troubled Assets Relief Program, prohibiting banks from using taxpayer funds to pay for country club memberships and swimming pools. This was understandable, as those funds were to be used to correct the crippled financial system and get credit flowing to the small businesses that needed it.However, it is hard to understand why federal stimulus money can’t be used by states and local communities to maintain valuable assets related to swimming -- especially at a time when these communities are struggling to comply with the provisions of the VGB Act. And, at a time when struggling, working class families are most likely to be staying close to home this summer with hopes of enjoying their neighborhood pool. In fact, there is historic precedent for municipalities to build new pools both as public works and as a needed recreational outlet for their citizens. During the Great Depression, the Works Progress Administration (WPA) built pools around the country to put people to work and to give the public a place to take their kids for fun and to learn to swim. A number of these pools are still in existence today.We don’t think it is fair that swimming pools are being labeled by Biden and others as excess in these desperate economic times.Please read the attached press release that hit the wire this morning. Please pass it on to your customers and others in your company and urge all to use the key messages to reach out to local media and government officials to be supportive of our industry as stimulus money is earmarked. Send the release to as many outlets as possible, in as many ways as available – snail mail, email, fax, blogs, chat rooms, tweets, etc.Release is attached.

Stop Picking on Pools, Joe!.DOC

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Replies

  • Art March 22, 2009 at 4:24pm
    great comment telling it like it is.just like the auto undustry there are manybusinesses that get work from a pool company.
  • Merry Wise March 21, 2009 at 7:07am
    This was mentioned this morning on Fox and Friends and Alyson Cammarata made kind of a negative comment about the issue. She has a blog if anyone else would like to post on it. I posted this comment this morning on it:
    "Comment by Merry Wise
    March 21st, 2009 at 8:36 am
    Alyson, we watch Fox and Friends every day and love it, but I must take issue with something you commented on this morning. My husband and I have earned, and I do mean EARNED, our living building, repairing and selling the products for swimming pools for 39 years.

    I dare to say we have created more jobs and supported more good, hard-working people in that time than Joe Biden ever thought about.

    I challenge you to come to Houston, Texas this August and spend a day helping build a swimming pool with us and see what we do to send in our share of those trillions of our money Joe is so anxious to “redistribute” to somebody who “deserves” it more.

    By the way, my husband’s day starts about 7-8 AM and goes until 10-11 Pm, nonstop, six days a week and he is 65 years old. Bring vitamins and sunscreen and perhaps salt pills, and dress for heat. It gets about 105 or so with high humidity in those holes.

    He’s a member of the Association of Pool and Spa Professionals and doesn’t “lobby” much. Most of the members are small, mom and pop businesses like ours, who unlike the members of Congress are trying to make an honest living.

    I’m totally sick of these overpaid clowns running around the country on my dime demagogueing issues like this with no understanding whatsoever of small businesses like ours."

    She had made a comment about the APSP being our "lobby".

    Here is the link to comment if anyone else wants to do so:
    http://greenroom.blogs.foxnews.com/2009/03/21/saturday-morning-11/#...

    I invited her to come see what we do in small business in the real world to build a swimming pool. Bet she wouldn't feel up to criticizing us after we got through with her following us around for a day, ya think? LOL
  • Dennis Mino March 18, 2009 at 8:55am
    We will forward to the communities we work with. There are many municipal pools that have either not opened, or actually filled in the deep end to a more shallow depth.Some have reduced the physical size of the pools because of operating funds issues. There is a local municipal pool which construction was paid for 50/50 by the city and the federal government. Last year they needed a new pump and other things which they did not have budget. The Federal government forced them to repair and open the pool because that was written into the acceptance of Grant money years earlier when it was constructed.. They did repair the pool and opened for part season as they could not afford additional maintenance such as chemicals. One thing we have going for us as an industry is Biden has been known to say one thing and mean another. Hopefully this is the case. Heck maybe we should reconsider our company product name "Ozone Joes" for the next three and a half years. When we were at our booth in Texas a couple weeks ago a Texas health inspector mentioned the Federal government is looking at mandating Alternative sanitizer requirements (such as Ozone) to reduce chlorine usage this year. Perhaps they (JOE) will make funding available for this effort.
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