By Kiera Morgan

The city of Newport got an unexpected and pleasant surprise recently in the form of a gift of a donation from the Doerfler Family Trust of $300,000 to help with the building of the Newport Aquatic Center with $25,000 set aside to provide scholarships. According to Jim Protiva, Newport Parks director the trust was set up to do good things for the community and the family felt that the pool project fit the criteria for the donation. Protiva said the money will help the city to accomplish the vision and the plan that the city initially wanted to do. Jim said construction of the aquatic center is going very well.

Jim said they excavated out a lot of the fill and removed it from the area and replaced it with sand from the NOAA dredgings, which will create a more solid foundation. He said they still have a lot of sewer and utility work that is taking place. Protiva said one of the issues was fixing problems from the past. One of those problems that had to be dealt with was the sewer connections from the rec center to the 2nd street sewer line. With the construction they were able to re-route the rec center sewer lines to connect further down the hill. There is hope that with this change the at the rec center will no longer flood. Construction is slated to be completed later this year.