Commission considers legalized swimming in the Cedar River

An ordinance decades old prohibits swimming in the Cedar River inside city limits. But members of the city's River Recreation Commission are looking at ways to amend the ordinance about swimming, in certain locations, as a way to get more people interested in using the river.

One potential spot for a river beach is an area along the Cedar River usually referred to as “the cove.” It's a protected backwater next to Mohawk Park, located directly across the river from better-known Ellis Park. The area was created decades ago when the Iowa Department of Transportation needed fill dirt to build Interstate 380. Water eventually filled the depression and a small channel connects it to the main part of the Cedar River.

Strange as it sounds now, swimming in the Cedar River was a common recreational activity in the early part of the 1900's. A public swimming area called “Ellis Beach” operated along Ellis Blvd. NW until the city opened a municipal pool in that area in the 1940's.

Carl Cortez, a member of the city river commission, said commissioners aren't talking about anything elaborate. And the commission is just at the point now of discussing how to word a change in the city ordinance to allow limited river swimming.

Any proposal would have to go through the city's public safety commission as well as the city council.