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The PG Pool is racist [MD]
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Anonymous
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When will the Prince's George's Pool in Mount Rainier open it's doors to the community? See here: https://pgpool.org
In Mount Rainier, there's a large private, members-only pool that few people in Mount Rainier can actually join. The wait list is like 10 years long! It's called the PG Pool. Most of the members seem to be white and they come from DC/MoCo. How could this be? The official line from this racist pool has been that membership dropped during the 1980s and 1990s and they had to open it up to people from outside the community (read: non-POCs from NE DC and MoCo). This is a BS racist line, imho. The real reason: This pool was "whites-only" until 1975. That's not a typo... 1975. Shocker alert: running a segregated pool in a majority-Black county isn't a great way to increase your membership roles. So this weird pool looked elsewhere for members - mostly white people from outside the area. I wish there was more news coverage on how these racist private pools in MD still operate and essentially segregate themselves from the broader community. End rant. |
Anonymous
| Many of the dues paying members of this pool saved it from bankruptcy. The community should thank us. |
Anonymous
Wow, this response smacks of the old "white man's burden" trope. |
Anonymous
| Place would have closed down years ago if not for this. |
Anonymous
| This seems like a great story one of the local news channels should highlight. Are current members able to privately sell their membership so that no one on the waitlist moves off? |
Anonymous
I think it can get passed along to other family members, so Black and Brown folks (and their children) in the community never really get a chance to join. Look how long this wait list is: https://mspremium.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/sites/123/2022/05/2022-05-05-Waitlist.pdf Racism is slow to die. |
Anonymous
Why should the community thank you? They can't join the pool. What is there to thank you for, you having a membership? |
Anonymous
| Why can’t you build a pool yourself? |
Anonymous
Why should “the community” thank you —if they don’t have access to the pool? |
Anonymous
I would definitely contact 7 on Your Side (or others) and see if they’ll look into it. You won’t get a lot of support/traction here unfortunately. |
Anonymous
Why can't pools desegregate? |
Anonymous
Because our coop pays taxes. The pool was desegregated in 1975 and we named a pool pavilion after an African American man who was denied membership based on his race in the 1970s. Time to move on folks. |
Anonymous
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We are in Arlington. For the private swim clubs, we were told to expect a 10 yr wait for a membership to become available.
Unfortunately private swim clubs don’t have the capacity of large public pools. Add in Arlington lacks available land for building or expansion of pools. The same situation repeats in many of the long established suburban neighborhoods in the DMV. |
Anonymous
DP here. Did your private swim club exclude Blacks until 1975 in a place where mostly Black people lived? |
Anonymous
| Build a new one then. |