By TRICIA NEAL CJ Staff Writer
It may be too cold outside to think of frolicking in the pool — but the topic of SomerSplash water park has been a hot one in the city of Somerset lately.
Questions arose when some residents were turned away after attempting to purchase season passes to the park.
Now, after a two week break, season passes to the water park are available for purchase once again.
Park manager Faith Anne Molyneaux says there was a two-week “pause” during which no passes were sold.
“(Somerset Mayor Eddie Girdler) was hoping to look at the prices to see if he could make them more affordable for people in the community before continuing to sell them at the pre-determined rate,” Molyneaux said.
However, since so many citizens were calling to purchase the passes, the decision was made to continue the sales earlier this week, she said.
Tickets will be available now through May 25 at the discounted rate of $49.95 each. After that, the price will go up to $69.95 each.
Passes can be obtained with a $10 deposit, as long as the balance is paid by May 25.
SomerSplash will open for its second season May 26.
Some citizens had heard that pass prices might go up this year, but Molyneaux says that was never an issue.
In response to some recent Internet forum postings claiming that water park employees had told callers they weren’t selling passes because Mayor Girdler wanted to raise the prices, Molyneaux said the comments were “completely untrue.”
Earlier this week, Mayor Girdler told council members that ticket sales had been stopped for a couple of weeks because the results of an audit had shown that some changes needed to be made. He did not elaborate on what those changes were, other than to say that “when the water park opened, it opened in a hurry, and mechanisms for sound business practices were not put into place.”
