A former Vale resident has donated money to allow the Vale Pool to let anyone in at no charge on hot days.
“She specifically wanted this for the pool for those really hot days for kids to have a place to go and get cooled off,” said Cathy Zacharias, president of the Vale Chamber of Commerce.
Zacharias said the donor, who wishes to remain anonymous, gave $9,800 to the chamber for the project. The chamber added $200 to round off the amount to $10,000 and recently presented Vale city officials with a check.
Vale City Manager Todd Fuller said the gift is “pretty amazing” and the city is considering how to use it.
“We haven’t really defined what the hot day is,” he said.
The National Weather Service in Boise reported that the number of days at 100 degrees or hotter recorded in Ontario since 1945 has averaged 15 a year. The longest stretch was 50 days in 1961.
The weather service said there were 27 100-degee days in 2024, 14 in 2023 and 34 in 2022.
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