2025 Annual Meeting
The Board of Directors (BoD) of FODE and friends came together for our annual meeting on Wednesday 28 May 2025 at 5pm at the Howson Branch Library. In attendance were Chris Flores, Karen Kelly, Sally Koch, Jeanette Scott, Blake Tollett, Jeff Hershey, Paul Bardagjy, Heidi Gibbons, Jeryll Adler, Haley Moberg, Kelly McDonald, Maureen Coulehan, Shelly Hardeman and Tom Fornoff.
From the Parks & Recreation Department (PARD) Aquatics Division we had Callahan Smith, Aaron Levine and Mark Nixon.
Maureen presented the annual Treasurer report; our balance as of 31 December 2024 was $75,546, as compared to our end of year balance in 2023 of $63,578 and end of year 2022 of $63,532. The $12,000 bump came from in person sales of t-shirts (thank you Heidi), donations and t-shirt sales through our updated website (thank you Heidi, Tom & company), an anonymous $5,000 donation received by Paul, and donations made in memory of our good friend Sarah Foster. The requisite annual financial information has been filed with the IRS.
We next addressed the minutes submitted by Blake from our last annual meeting in 2024, and with a quorum being present, they were accepted as submitted.
Continuing, the following slate of directors were elected to serve for this coming year:
Tom Fornoff Heidi Gibbons
Shelley Hardeman Sarah Searight
Blake Tollett Vickie Tatum
Maureen Coulehan Sally Koch
Paul Bardagjy Haley Moberg
Joe Luke Jeanette Scott
Benjamin Serrato Christina Flores
Billy Apt Jeryll Adler
The following officers were re-elected to serve another year:
President: Paul Bardagjy
Vice President: Christina Flores
Secretary: Blake Tollett
Treasurer: Maureen Coulehan
Events Coordinator: Benjamin Serrato
And Tom Fornoff was elected as Communications Director.
Our VP Chris began our general discussions by suggesting that we establish an emeritus section of past Board of Directors on our website and she will work with Tom Fornoff on this. Chris also related that she had formally applied for a Community Activated Parks Project (CAPP) with PARD to re-landscape the gallery area, the area to the east of the stairs and below the upper patio. She continues to work with PARD to amend the soil and would welcome help on this preparation. There is also the need to facilitate with PARD the relocation of the tree that has been growing in the area. In the fall she will ask FODE for funds to plant native species such as Desert Willows and Red Yuccas, a horticulture palate that reflects how Eilers’ Park is planted.
Under discussion with the Aquatics Division staff present:
Chris asked if the picnic furniture on the upper patio could be rejuvenated. Aaron told us this was doable and would place the ask in the pool’s maintenance work order system. Once the furniture is refinished PODE will purchase some collapsible umbrellas.
Paul asked if the trailers currently situated just to the east of the women’s dressing area could be relocated. This too was thought to be doable.
The Austin Parks Foundation (APF) is sponsoring Thursday movie nights at the pool with dates of 12 June, 10 July and 14 August. FODE should be able to sell our t-shirts those evenings.
We then had a discussion led by Paul on water matters. It seems that during the annual spring cleaning of the pool that our wells #3 & #4 were both cleaned out, a process that showed the water table below is dropping due to the ongoing drought. The result is slow draws for our re-fillings. The #4 well has a deeper shaft that would allow the pump to be lowered, but the current electrical supply to it is not sufficient to work the lowered pump. To address this lack, there may be work arounds such as cannibalizing well #3’s electrical supply source or trying to use the electrical supply from a nearby abandoned well. Neither of these options are ideal. We then discussed drilling another well, probably just off the parking lot between the bathhouse and the entrance to Eiler’s Park. This location would have a readily available electrical supply, a substantial cost savings, but there is the question of whether this new straw is going into the known depleted reservoir.
We then discussed the issue of adult bullying at the pool. PARD is committed to addressing this. We also discussed increased mobility options to go from the bathhouse down to the pool; we have in hand a basic outline of a plan to place a walkway to the east side of the property, but the plan has yet to be lined-out, funded and implemented.
We then discussed parking issues. In the short run, the current lot needs to be used more efficiently. Suggestions include:
Once school buses unload their passengers the buses need to be removed from the lot.
Delivery trucks for the adjacent bars and restaurants need to be prohibited from using the lot to turn around or park.
The west side parking lot now being used for police parking needs to be utilized solely for aquatics staff parking.
The longer-term solution is to reconfigure how the lot is accessed and to monitor this new access. The board has been developing a longer-term plan and we reviewed the attached summary.
Minutes prepared and submitted by Blake Tollett, Secretary.
Deep Eddy Vision Project May 2025
The Deep Eddy Vision Project is a citizen-led initiative to define optimal capital improvements and create a roadmap for how the City of Austin’s historic Deep Eddy Pool and adjoining Eilers Park could evolve over the coming decades and century as a pool and a park. Community members seek plans for addressing the non-sanctioned use of parking spaces by adjacent commercial enterprises, and for gaining more benefit from areas that are fallow or deployed in non-recreational use.
HOW WE START
The Deep Eddy Vision Project (“Vision Project”) will respectfully rely on the National Register of Historic Places’ guidelines and overlay proposed plans on the City of Austin’s nine+ acres of public parkland, pool and historic buildings to form a project plan.
The first desired outcome, or “deliverables,” of the Vision Project are expected to include:
The first draft of a document outlining the goals, constraints, and priorities driving the Project. Tom Fornoff, an uncompensated volunteer and Friends of Deep Eddy Board member, has offered to create this draft.
A one-time visual/conceptual set of designs for one or more sets of capital improvements, or a phased set of capital improvements to be done over time, with rough build budget estimates for each phase. These conceptual designs will be for the sake of promoting early discussion, inputs, and the start of fund-raising. FODE leadership expects to retain Limbacher and Godfrey, licensed Austin architects, to develop the initial conceptual plans. He has been selected based on his firm’s experience rehabbing the Deep Eddy Bathhouse in 2007, and his general experience working on Austin’s historic buildings.
The first two deliverables for the Vision Project will be managed and reviewed by uncompensated Friends of Deep Eddy volunteers serving on a subcommittee. These deliverables and recommendations will then be subject to review and approval by the entire Friends of Deep Eddy membership group.
WHAT TO IMPROVE
Initial, limited swimmer/stakeholder inputs were identified in a meeting in October 2024, and later ranked by Friends of Deep Eddy board members in a March 2025 meeting. The top priorities identified for improvements, including some that are part of the City of Austin’s ongoing responsibilities, are:
Improve parking and vehicular traffic for access and flow.
Ensure the continuance of clear, cool, fresh water and water operating infrastructure such as wells, including the annual maintenance of the wells.
Improve access for people under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and for families with strollers.
Add usability projects (accessories and amenities) for seating, shade, play areas, and informative-historic signage.
Address infrastructure issues (bottom of pool, walls of the pool, etc.)
HOW TO PAY FOR IT
The long-term costs of developing Vision Project components will be explored further. The Deep Eddy Vision Project funding could include public taxpayer dollars from various sources and appropriate non-profit grants. The first two deliverables will be funded with unrestricted funds from donors given to Friends of Deep Eddy (FODE) a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
FODE acknowledges any and all improvements resulting from the Vision Project will be subject to approval by the City of Austin, Parks and Recreation Department, including the Aquatics Division, appropriate city boards and commissions and elected people, as required by Austin’s laws.
Any recommended capital improvements shall also include budget estimates for the ongoing maintenance of such improvements, since Aquatics annual maintenance dollars are always constrained.
FODE’s development of this Vision Project does not, in any way, commit FODE nor Austin PARD/Aquatics to ANY material change or capital project.
Concurrent with the Vision Project development, FODE will continue prioritizing and advocating with Austin PARD and Aquatics for maintenance and minor improvements needed, near term, to enhance user experience at Deep Eddy pool and Eilers Park.
Vision Project overview written by Tom Fornoff, Communications Director.