Dear Rady JCC Members,
Beginning this week, we instituted temporary new lap swimming hours in our aquatics facility due to the start of our Rady JCC Day Camps. They are:
Monday-Friday:
7:00 a.m. – 7:45 a.m.
8:00 a.m. – 8:45 a.m.
4:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m.
5:15 p.m. – 6:15 p.m.
6:30 p.m. – 7:15 p.m.
Please note that lap swimming times on Saturdays and Sundays are not affected.
Since Monday, we have received some questions from a few of our lap swimmers about our temporary shortened hours and our rationale as to why we made this change. I want you to know that we continue to listen to our members and appreciate your feedback.
Effective next week, weekday morning hours will slightly change to better accommodate your needs. Our first booking time will now be 7:15 a.m. and our second booking time will be 8:15 a.m. Both slots will still be 45 minutes. We are doing this in in order to allow for more time to check in and change.
We continue to analyze and assess the logistics of our aquatics facility to see if we can safely offer more lap swim times while our Rady JCC Day Camps are operating. After an in-depth assessment, we are able to offer additional lap swim booking times during certain weeks this summer based on certain day camps not swimming on those days.
For the specific weeks beginning on July 27, August 3, and August 10, Monday through Friday available lap swim booking times will now be:
7:00 a.m. – 7:45 a.m.
8:00 a.m. – 8:45 a.m.
3:30 p.m. – 4:15 p.m.
4:30 p.m. – 5:15 p.m.
5:30 p.m. – 6:15 p.m.
6:30 p.m. – 7:15 p.m.
Please note that lap swimming times on Saturdays and Sundays are not affected.
Finally, please note that beginning Tuesday, July 14, and every Tuesday evening thereafter, we are now offering Aquafit class in our pool from 6:15 p.m. – 7:15 p.m. Because of this, Tuesday evening lap swimming will be slightly affected. Aquafit class registration opens 72 hours in advance and can be completed through our pre-booking system.
Individual bookings for lap swimming can also be made up to 72 hours in advance. Family change rooms will be available for your use beginning 15 minutes before your scheduled lap swim time. All lap lanes must be booked either through our online pre-booking system, available at any time of day, or by calling the Aquatics Manager at 204.477.7541. Please note that calling does not guarantee a booking time as we operate with reduced staff and are not always immediately available.
If you have having difficulties navigating our pre-booking system, please refer to our online video tutorial.
If you are not able to use the aquatics facility under our temporary new hours and would like to freeze your membership during this time at no cost, please let us know. We can freeze your membership until our 2020 Rady Day Camps conclude. Please note if you do select this option, you will not able to use our facility at any time.
This pandemic has forced all of us to change to make temporary adjustments in all facets of our lives. We thank you for your understanding as we continue to navigate through these waters.
Warm regards,
Mykayla Santilli
Acting Aquatics Manager
Rady Jewish Community Centre
204.477.7541
Reduced Lap Swimming Hours Rationale
For those who would like to know more about why we made the decision for our temporary lap swimming hours during our 2020 Rady JCC Day Camps, please read the information below.
Earlier this summer, we received the green light from the provincial government that we could offer day camps. This was before we knew we were going to be part of Phase 2 of the province’s reopening strategy. We got to work, developing our day camps with proper social distancing guidelines in effect. Part of the Rady Day Camp experience includes daily swimming for our campers. In order for us to properly practice social distancing as well as to be able to allow for proper deep cleaning and sanitizations, we needed to space out our swim times for our campers and limit the number of campers in the pool at a given time. To do this, we made the decision to stagger swim times throughout the entire day. We built this into the entire campership schedule during our planning.
After we put this together, we found out that we were to be included in Phase 2 and that Phase 2 would begin in June (we anticipated this to be much later in the summer). When we got this news in late May, we did a full internal assessment to determine when would be the proper date for us to reopen our fitness and aquatics facility to our members knowing we first needed to ensure we had the proper social distancing, restrictions, and cleaning guidelines in place. Everything we have done and continue to do is done so with the safety and well-being of our members and staff top-of-mind. From here, we determined June 15 would be our reopening date.
We knew prior to our reopening that our pool would be temporarily unavailable during our 8 weeks of camps as our camps schedule had already been finalized by that point. We had an internal discussion prior to June 15 about whether or not we should reopen our pool to our lap swimmers to the shortened booking times right from the start or if we should open it fully and then restrict our hours beginning on July 6, the start of our day camps. We determined that we would open our booking times up fully and then restrict our hours once the camps started. We should have communicated this better so our swimmers would have been able to better prepare themselves for the shortened swim times and we recognize this error.
Every decision we make here is done so with the safety and well-being of our members, staff, and volunteers top-of-mind.