Ellen Shapiro Natatorium

Pool is giant and pretty clean and there are locker rooms for use, but bring flip flops. Also, my toddler was free, and I got in for $ 5, so that is a plus.
The deck of the pool, is like walking on an NYC street in your bare feet. Hair balls, garbage, bandaids, dust and dirt litter the deck, as well as collect in the drains.
My son and I arrived to an empty pool, to see the lifeguard laying on some kind of platform reading a book. I thought nothing of it until I realized how filthy the deck was. He should be sweeping when the pool is empty rather than laying around!
The other downfall is that the pool is frigid! I thought, «no big deal, we’ll get used to the temp.» Nope. After only an hour, my 3yr old sons lips were nearly blue and he was shaking so badly he could hardly stand in the water on his own. You know kids, they’ll swim in any temp, but the blue lips were my cue to cut our swim time short. If I was cold, I knew he was freezing.
Having just moved from NY to OH, I have a new appreciation for the FREE NY public pools in our neighborhood, which were always much cleaner than this Wooster YMCA pool.