YWCA Shirley Leavell Branch

This pool is severely mismanaged. I recommend to all the paying members to try Hawkins pool instead. The water at Hawkins is pristine and the staff are courteous, and professionally trained to manage this important community resource. Conversely, the staff at the YWCA are not trained to communicate or behave in a manner that corresponds with the mission of the YWCA. The pool policies are not aligned with the standards of a non-profit. In fact, the swim lesson coaches and the aquatics class instructors are allowed to take over you lap swim lane, even when you are swimming in it, to accommodate their late arrivals. The group lessons are considered priority as they bring in money over the standard membership fee. The life guards will force you out of the pool 15 to 20 minutes before closing, so that they can clean up and close up, essentially disregarding the pool time granted to the patrons by the published schedule. During the summer, so many people use the pool, and the pool management is so interested in profit that pool cleaning is secondary to maximizing profit . The water becomes putrid, cloudy and smelly - no one cares. When you try to have these issues addressed by the director of aquatics, she will ignore you until she is compelled to address you. Once you do get to issue your concerns to her, she offers zero resolution and everything continues as before. In my case she banned me from my membership after I complained too many times, even though I am a single mother who had been a member along with my two daughters for more than ten years. The whole affair is diametrically opposed to the "Empowering women" mission. The aquatics director does not deserve to represent this organization.