Mayor: Reopen Lowell Park as a swimming spot

DIXON – Lowell Park should once again be a swimming spot, Mayor Jim Burke said at Wednesday’s Dixon Park Board meeting.

Once the site where Ronald “Dutch” Reagan was lifeguard and supposedly saved 77 swimmers, the beach at Lowell Park could draw in tourists and national attention with its reopening, Burke said.

“Obviously there will be a few hurdles to clear,” he wrote in a letter to the board. “I ask the board to discuss this idea with an open mind and consider reopening for the 2013 season what potentially can become the best-known swimming and beach site in the United States.”

Swimming was stopped in the late 1950s or early 1960s, he said, because of nationwide fears that bacteria in river and lake water was causing polio.

“I hear people today talk about how dirty the river is,” Vice President Ron Pritchard said. “They haven’t seen nothing like what we saw back in those days. There were literally things floating down the river that I don’t want to describe, but regulations have really changed that. It’s certainly not a crystal clear river, but it surely isn’t as dirty as it was.”

There will be costs to maintain the beachfront, though, Pritchard said.

Burke said he would look into the city assisting with manpower and equipment.

Board member John Weitzel proposed the same idea several years ago, when the Environmental Protection Agency OK’d the Rock River for swimming.

The problem at the time was that insurance would go “sky high,” Weitzel said.

Executive Director Deb Carey will look into what it would cost, she said.

Burke’s proposal included cordoning off a section of the river and posting lifeguards.