When Columbia Pool reopened in May 2025, two of its first swimmers were adults who had grown up swimming there. The park’s story runs through early swim meets, neighborhood renewal, community murals and the work of longtime youth advocate Marty Yerby.
Updated 2026.
The park is at 595 High Street, Turlock. Its playgrounds, courts and picnic areas make it an everyday neighborhood park; Columbia Pool and the Marty Yerby center give it a larger role in the life of the Westside.
Where generations learned to swim
Columbia Pool was built in 1957. The original pool and its later splash pad became familiar landmarks in southwest Turlock. City engineering background.
At the 2025 reopening, former lifeguard Brent Bohlender recalled that the Turlock swim club began competing here in 1958. The mayor presented medals at larger meets, and the pool was a gathering place before Turlock High had its own pool. For many Westside children, Columbia was their introduction to swimming. Bohlender’s recollections and the reopening.
A park that the neighborhood helped bring back
Columbia’s story includes periods of neglect as well as renewal. In the 1980s and early 1990s, vandalism and illegal activity damaged the park’s reputation. A later Journal account describes a change beginning in the mid-1990s, when the city invested in the park and promptly painted over graffiti. JoLynn DiGrazia of Westside Ministries remembered the speed of that cleanup as an important turning point.
The water playground, added around 2010, brought another reason for families to come. National Night Out gatherings and neighborhood programs helped establish the park as a place to meet again. The same retrospective connected those improvements to a healthier surrounding neighborhood. The park’s earlier revitalization.
Who was Marty Yerby?
The community building’s name honors a former Turlock City Council member whose work reached well beyond City Hall. Marty Yerby coached Little League, helped raise money for Turlock Youth Football and served as a member and president of the Turlock Westside Neighborhood Association. He also supported playground improvements at Wakefield School. He died in 2006.
The city’s recreation facilities study dates the center building to 1978. It later housed the PAL youth program and reopened as a community center in 2009. After another closure during the pandemic, the center reopened in January 2025 with accessible bathroom improvements and updated audio and visual equipment. The free afterschool program offered homework help, computers, games and crafts. For present program availability, use the city’s afterschool and out-of-school resources or call Recreation at 209-668-5594. Building history; Yerby and the center’s 2025 reopening.
The murals were a community conversation
Public art at Columbia Park has grown from conversations with the people who spend time here. In 2018, Stanislaus State art professor Jacob Weigel and university students led a mural project on the pool’s exterior walls. They gathered ideas from neighborhood residents, park users, children at Osborn Elementary and Westside Ministries before finalizing the design. Community paint days turned those ideas into birds, butterflies, fish and a bright sun across 960 square feet of wall. The project formed part of Mayor Gary Soiseth’s public policy initiative. The 2018 mural dedication.
A new chapter followed in 2024. Turlock artist Nicolle Jones worked with the Stanislaus Arts Council, supported by a Heartland Creative Corps grant, on three murals with messages of kindness and inclusion. One was painted on the Marty Yerby building; the project’s messages included “Love Always Wins,” “We Rise by Lifting Others” and “No Place for Hate.” Jones’s own children played at Columbia Park, giving the project a connection to the neighborhood’s daily life. Jones’s mural project.
Why the pool had to be rebuilt
The old pool closed in 2019. Worn surfaces, aging equipment, restroom problems and inadequate accessible entry made reopening more complicated than a fresh coat of paint. A smaller repair proposal gave way to a full replacement. In April 2022, the City Council directed staff to plan demolition and a new pool, deck, landscaping and buildings. The demolition and construction contract decisions followed in September 2023. The city’s replacement project announcement.
Construction took longer than the original summer 2024 target. In March 2025, city officials reported that a gas utility connection required a different connection point to supply the pool equipment properly. Columbia finally welcomed swimmers back on May 17, 2025. Councilmember Rebecka Monez and former city manager Reagan Wilson, both childhood users of the pool, took the ceremonial first plunge. The final construction update; The reopening celebration.
The roughly $9.1 million project drew on city cannabis business fees, federal American Rescue Plan funding and a Turlock Irrigation District grant for energy-saving features. The rebuilt facility brought accessible pool entry, new restrooms, changing areas, a concessions building and shaded gathering spaces. The investment restored a public swimming option on the Westside after nearly six years away. The funding and rebuild.
What to do at Columbia Park
- Play and picnic: the city lists a large and small playground, three large covered picnic areas with barbecues, smaller picnic spaces and open grass.
- Bring a ball: there is a full basketball court, two half-courts and a multipurpose court with built-in soccer goals. Perimeter and interior paths offer a walk around the park. Official park features.
- Swim or use the splash pad: these are separate seasonal facilities with separate schedules. Pool admission and lessons are managed through Recreation. Use the public-pool information, splash-pad information and aquatics registration for the relevant season. The pool entrance is at 600 Columbia Avenue, Turlock.
Columbia is especially useful when a family wants several activities in one stop: a playground, a pickup game and, during the operating season, water play. Its swimming facilities are its biggest distinction among Turlock’s neighborhood parks. For a longer open-space outing or a different playground, compare it with the other places in our Turlock parks guide.
Have a Columbia Pool memory, an old park photograph or a detail about its earliest years? Share it with LocalTurlock.
