• Litter, pollutants, animal excrement, lawn fertilizers and herbicides all flow into Madison’s lakes and gather in the muddy lakebeds.
• The Yahara River, located on Lake Mendota’s north shore, feeds Mendota and Monona with agricultural runoff. Agricultural waste, manure, algae promoting fertilizers and other chemical pollutants all gather in Madison’s lakes. The conditions provided by city waste and rural waste make Madison’s lakes an ideal environment for dangerous bacteria and pollutants.
• E Coli bacterium from fecal matter plagues Madison’s lakes.  Last year E Coli bacteria populations forced Lake Wingra to close to swimmers
• An unknown number of cattle killed by anthrax at the turn of the century remain buried at Willow’s beach on Lake Mendota. Erosion could eventually expose swimmers to this deadly disease.
• In the long run, pool construction would cost less than cleaning the swimming areas of Madison’s lakes. A University of Wisconsin survey revealed that Madison residents were willing to spend upwards of $50 million dollars to clean the lakes. Public pool construction costs pale in comparison to this massive figure. While the water quality in Madison’s lakes must be maintained, alternatives to lakes must be investigated when making such enormous investments. The city of Madison can clean the lakes and build a pub lic pool at the same time.
• The goal of a cleaner Madison and the construction of a public pool both follow the same environmental commitment to providing people with the safest possible swimming water. Building a public pool makes sense from an environmental perspective. Swimmers must be given an alternative to dirty lake water. We need a public pool.

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