Do the Backstroke: City Announces Effort to Teach All New Yorkers to Swim

It's been 75 years since New York City's first pools were built—and still some New Yorkers don't know how to swim.

But the city wants to change that.

On Monday at the Red Hook Pool, surrounded by hundreds of swimmers, both young and old, Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe announced the formation of the NYC Swim Council.

"Still so many kids don't know how to swim," said Benepe. "We've made it our mission...Our goal is to teach every second grader how to swim."

The NYC Swim Council is co-chaired by Dr. Jane Katz, Professor of Health and Physical Education at John Jay College and Ann Buttenwieser, Adjunct Associate Professor at Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation and Executive Director of the Neptune Foundation—the organization that brought the floating pool to Brooklyn and the Bronx.

The Swim Council was launched to celebrate 75 years of "summer swimming" in NYC pools. In 1936, the Works Progress Administration (WPA), at the direction of then President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, built 11 pools, including the Red Hook Pool. The project was implemented by then Mayor Fiorello La Guardia and Parks Commissioner Robert Moses.

"The WPA era represented a concerted effort to provide New Yorkers with access to safe, clean and majestic places to swim," said Benepe.

Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz said the pools are particularly important for residents of Brooklyn.

"To a generation of Brooklynites this pool represented their Hamptons," he said. "This is a beautiful resource."