DECATUR — City council wards have been redrawn in Decatur to accommodate the growing population and the housing developments along Grant Street.

The council voted to pass an ordinance making the new boundaries official at Monday’s meeting. The new boundaries will not add to the number of wards in the city and will leave all current council members yet living in their respective wards. Decatur has three wards, with two council positions elected from each ward.

Data from the 2010 census shows that Decatur's population has grown by about 300 people over the past 10 years. The addition of a subdivision and two apartment complexes along Grant Street also caused the wards to become precariously unbalanced, with more than 900 people in ward 1and around 300 people in wards 2 and 3. State law requires wards populations to be equal and balanced, with courts allowing population variations up to 10 percent.

At Monday's meeting, Mayor Charles Linam presented council members with two proposals drawn by Jeff Hawkins, director of the Northwest Arkansas Regional Planning Commission, to fix the lopsided population numbers.

One of the proposals would have added a fourth ward. Linam recommended against the addition of a fourth ward, pointing out how difficult it has been to fill all the council seats with just three wards.

“We all agree on that,” said alderwoman Gina Holt.

The proposal the council voted to accept will leave Ward 1 with 538 residents, Ward 2 with 571 residents and Ward 3 with 590 residents. The issue will have to be revisited in 10 years after the 2020 census.

Linam said he was very pleased with the way the wards were redrawn with definitive boundaries. The former ward boundaries cut between houses where, in some instances, there were no roads, he said.

“Luckily, our city has no municipal elections this year. We'll be getting this out of the way well ahead of time,” Linam said.

Swimming pool

Despite good attendance, Decatur's public swimming pool still lost more than $7,000 this summer, Linam reported, leading council members to consider closing the pool in favor of a splash park.

The loss is down from the $9,000 to $10,000 the pool lost the last two years it was open. There are some costs that can be cut next year, such as training expenses if the same lifeguards are rehired, according to city administrative assistant Kim Wilkins. However, the pool will facesome major additional expenses to make it handicap accessible if it stays open next year, including the purchase of a new wheelchair lift and the building of a new wheelchair-accessible parking area, sidewalk and gate.

“I thought we had pretty good attendance at the pool this year but that is still a sizable amount of money,” Linam said as he asked council members to carefully consider the issue of keeping the pool open next year.

Holt brought up the idea of closing the pool and building a new splash park.

“They are supposed to be the latest thing,” said alderwoman Sandy Duncan, pointing out that the city would not have to worry about children drowning.

Wilkins said she had done some research on splash parks, and council members asked her to find out more details about the costs involved for the next city council meeting.

News, Pages 7 on 09/14/2011