Pass for pools

I have sent the mayor and every councillor individually a letter as I am appalled by the council’s lack of a mandate in public facilities for vaccination.

I had a very unhelpful phone call today with a council staff member who was in charge of this area, who seemed to think that all public facilities have to be open to all. This is certainly not the case and many councils are only opening their facilities to vaccinated persons.

I ama member of the CLM gym at the Lido and am fully vaccinated. Much to my disappointment I have discovered that unvaccinated people are being allowed into the Lido at orange level to swim in both the indoor and outdoor pools. This is of grave concern to me and many other Lido users as a considerable number of users are health compromised, elderly or young children who cannot be vaccinated.

Although I amaware local government can make its own decision on whether public facilities should be restricted to vaccinated patrons at this level, I am disappointed that Palmerston North council is not following the lead of Wellington, Porirua and Lower Hutt cities to require Covid passes to access their libraries, pools and other facilities.

We put ourselves forward as a city of knowledge having Massey University and many other educational institutions in our city, so surely we should do everything feasible to keep Delta from spreading in our community and encourage everyone to be vaccinated.

The Makino Pool in Feilding requires people to be vaccinated, so the Lido in Palmerston North is leaving itself open to getting all the unvaccinated from the Feilding area whowant a swim. (Abridged) Susan Stirling, Palmerston North