A new pool that satisfies no one
There seems to be a bait-and-switch between the City Park Pool design that the public chose (after exhaustive discussion and compromise among varied interests) and the final City Park Pool Design that was recently submitted by Iowa City’s Parks and Recreation Department and approved by the Iowa City Council.
This pool design satisfies none of the requested interests submitted by the public: water walking space, a sufficient number of long course (50 meter) lap swim lanes, deep water aerobics space, a connected swim space for families with toddlers and older children, short course (25 yard) lap lanes, water features such as slides or the lazy river from the last plan, deep water play options (without slides or diving boards) to promote learning to swim.
The most simple and most cost-effective solution would be to use the current pool footprint—that is already working for most of the features requested by the public above—while turning one shallow wing into a zero-entry option. The argument that the new pool design will reduce the carbon footprint is not valid as City Park Pool has never been heated.
While the University of Iowa has taken low-cost opportunities for exercise and wellness away from its taxpayers within the last decade, let’s make sure the City of Iowa City is supporting the mission of allowing an aging population opportunities for low-impact, aquatic exercise as well as spaces for equitable access to the right to learn to swim. Iowa City already has an historically significant pool in the middle of a beautiful oak grove in Upper City Park that satisfies more of the requested needs of the public than the latest iteration of the new pool design.
Deb Tunwall
Iowa City
A push to ‘save Medicaid’
A movement of ‘Save Medicaid’ rallies swept across our country and state recently. The U.S. House passed a budget resolution instructing our Congresswoman Mariannette Miller-Meeks’ House Energy & Commerce Committee to cut $880 billion over the next 10 years. The Congressional Budget Office confirmed that to achieve this resolution, significant cuts to Medicaid are needed.
As a nurse leader and community organizer, it’s important we understand that ‘Save Medicaid’ is a misnomer— it’s really ‘Save Everybody’. I’ve heard many seniors, people with disabilities, and veterans tell me they fear they won’t survive these cuts. However, if you have amazing private insurance, and if Miller-Meeks defunds Medicaid, let me walk you through how you can die too.
First, rural hospitals, clinics, and nursing homes that depend on Medicaid reimbursements will shut down. Next, those patients flood into larger hospitals that are already at capacity and simply don’t have rooms, procedural suites, or staff, to take on more patients. Lastly, your father has chest pain, but the ER wait time is 16 hours and they don’t have a bed; your wife is bleeding but there’s no colonoscopy availability until next year; your husband has aggressive pancreatic cancer but oncology can’t see them for three months. Pick your scenario, there’s a million ways to die. All with perfectly great private insurance.
This isn’t a Medicaid recipient problem. This is an everybody problem. Whether it’s your parents, spouse, or children, Medicaid recipients are literally their last line of defense. We must defend them.
Eric Kusiak
Iowa City
A physician’s take on the measles
I am a pediatrician and a physician resident.
Taking care of children, there is much we can’t control. Children are born with genetic diseases.They get cancer. They fall and hurt themselves. They don’t listen to their elders. Which is why it’s important to do our best with what we can control.
Measles is highly contagious. In the not so distant past, three to four million people wouldcontract measles every year. This is because, before vaccinations, measles had a 90 percent chance of spreading from an infected to a noninfected individual after close contact. Out of those three to four million infected people, 50,000 would require hospitalization, 1,000 would develop inflammation and swelling of the brain, and 500 would die. (how many would be left with long term physical sequelae?)
Our first measles vaccine was licensed in 1963, followed by a second (and current) version in 1968. Our U.S. vaccination was so effective, and so universally practiced, that measles was officially eliminated from the U.S. in the year 2000. In this state that is called “elimination,” even if someone contracts measles overseas and returns to the U.S., the disease will not spread because we have attained a 95 percent population immunity rate (As recently as 2019-2020, 95 percent of kindergarteners in the U.S. were vaccinated against measles).
Yet here we are, in 2025, in the midst of a measles outbreak. Recent data from the CDC (24April 2025) reported 884 cases across 30 jurisdictions, for a four month reporting period.Ninety-seven percent of those infected were unvaccinated, the vast majority of whom arechildren, children who don’t get to vote. Three of these children have needlessly died.The solution is staring us in the face. Please join me in advocating for our next generation byprotecting them with the measles vaccine.
Cassie Wassink
Iowa City
Asking Miller-Meeks not to cut Medicaid
Over my lunch hour Tuesday, I heard that my Representative, Marianette Miller-Meeks, would be holding a tele-town hall that night. Luckily, I was able to rearrange my evening caregiving schedule for my child with special needs so I could attend.
When I received the call to join the town hall, all I heard was the recorded voice of Miller-Meeks, saying the mailbox was full and I should call back later.
This is unsurprising for Miller-Meeks. She has not held a single public event since being reelected.
If I ever get the chance to speak to Rep Miller-Meeks, I plan to ask her to commit to not cut Medicaid, a program that provides health care to 700,000 Iowans – almost 1 in 4 of us. including my family.
Medicaid doesn’t just provide “traditional” health care. It also provides respite for families caring for medically complex family members 24/7 so that we can get a full night’s sleep or visit with friends, occupational and physical therapy, and housing support to thousands of Iowans with disabilities, including children.
But it’s not always easy to access this program. The wait list in Iowa to get the intellectual disability waiver (one “flavor” of Medicaid in Iowa) is eight years. The wait certainly harmed my family.
I would think a physician like Miller-Meeks, who took an oath to do no harm, would be looking to improve this program, not cut it.
Jonna Higgins-Freese
Iowa City
This article originally appeared on Iowa City Press-Citizen: A new pool that satisfies no one | Letters
Reporting by Iowa City Press-Citizen / Iowa City Press-Citizen
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