Dave Zweifel:

I remember writing a column a couple of years after the pool opened chiding a group of Madison alders who, during budget deliberations, were upset that the pool’s admission charges didn’t cover 100% of its annual costs. My column declared that a city that had just been given a first-class swimming pool for a paltry $500,000 of taxpayer money could afford to subsidize a few pennies of the kids’ admission fees.

The Goodman brothers called me the next day to say thanks. That was their sentiments, exactly.

If Madison has any respect for the two brothers who have contributed so mightily to better all our lives, it will stop using the pool as a pawn in its budget crisis.

It’s closed for the season now, but thousands of children learned how to swim, how to compete or just had fun or had something to do during the long, hot summer. If we can’t afford that, levy limits or not, we should be ashamed.

The strings program was used in this way over the years, as well.

Notes and links on the well funded Madison School District’s $607,000,000 November tax & $pending increase referendum along with the City of Madison’s vote on the same.