CHICO — Despite community concern over a possible shigella infection in Sycamore Pool, city officials assure it is safe to swim at the One-Mile Recreation Area of Bidwell Park. The city of Chico said it received reports of social media posts alleging the contamination of the Sycamore Pool with shigella. The city confirmed negative results for coliform bacteria through an Instagram post on Friday.
Erik Gustafson, the city’s Public Works director of Operations and Maintenance, said weekly tests are done on Tuesdays and third-party labs are utilized to avoid bias. The city tests the pool’s water for coliform bacteria, which include fecal coliform and E. coli.
However, the city does not test for shigella, another coliform bacterium, and is still researching on a testing solution that can. “If there is a test available for open water, we’ll gladly utilize it. But as far as we know now, there’s not,” Gustafson said.
“Public Health knows of none, and the several of the labs and samplers that we use here in Chico that are state certified also do not know of one that’s available yet.” Being a natural body of water without chlorine treatment, Gustafson said the pool is expected to have a natural amount of bacteria in it. In the city’s most recent published test from July 3, results show that the total coliform count in the upstream and downstream sections were greater than 2419 Most Probable Number per 100 milliliters.
However, the E.coli counts were at 111 MPN/10.