HENRICO COUNTY, Va. — Lawyers for the family of King Overton toured the SwimRVA North facility in Henrico on Thursday with their experts, weeks after the 9-year-old drowned during a summer camp at the facility on June 15.
"King was in a place that was supposed to protect him and watch him," King's aunt, Cherry Stone, said.
Following Overton's death, questions arose about whether SwimRVA's summer camps were licensed and therefore required to meet state staffing, training, and ratio requirements. A parent of another child who attended the camp also raised safety concerns.
"I'd like to know how many kids were in the pool at the time this happened, how many lifeguards were at the pool when this happened, how long had those lifeguards been in their positions and what were the ages of those lifeguards?" the parent said.
The Virginia Department of Education later determined SwimRVA was operating an unlicensed child day program. Investigators said the summer camps did not qualify for the licensing exemptions SwimRVA claimed applied.
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The agency ordered SwimRVA to submit a compliance plan by July 27 and either come into full compliance, qualify for an exemption, or cease operations by Aug. 14.
SwimRVA had believed its summer program met the definition of a "single focus" camp centered on swimming, which would exempt it from licensure. The VDOE disagreed.
The state found SwimRVA offered a range of activities at the swim camps that had nothing to do with swimming — including out-of-water kickball and human bowling. Of the nine hours per day of activities, the state's investigation showed only 1.5 hours were dedicated to swimming lessons.
The nonprofit later submitted a plan of compliance detailing changes it would make immediately to bring its summer camps into compliance with state rules. The plan was due Monday, but the plan obtained through a public records request was submitted two days later on Wednesday.
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On Friday, VDOE told CBS 6 "The Department received a compliance plan submission from SwimRVA by the July 27 deadline. The VDOE subsequently requested that additional information be submitted by July 29, which SwimRVA provided as requested. "
The plan outlines daily activities for the camp, including afternoon swim, Olympic Theater — featuring Olympic swimming clips — swim crafts, and 1.5 hours a day of dry-land training to reinforce swimming techniques.
In a letter to VDOE, SwimRVA Executive Director Adam Kenendy said the organization would answer any questions through him or its legal counsel and welcomed a state inspection.
VDOE said it had reviewed the compliance plan and will monitor SwimRVA's efforts to come into full compliance.
On Thursday, the attorneys representing King Overton’s family, Mark Krudys and Ben Crump, sent a letter to VDOE asking them to reject Swim RVA’s single focus claim and require them to obtain a license before operating a summer camp.
In that letter, they stated they had obtained the non-profit’s compliance plan, but they stated they had not received Swim RVA's revised swim camp schedule.
CBS 6 investigative reporter Melissa Hipolit had obtained that via a public records request and sent it to the attorneys to see if that changed their letter or statement in any way.
Krudys responded with the following statement:
This afternoon, after we issued our statement on SwimRVA’s compliance plan, a member of the press forwarded to us a document represented to be the revised SwimRVA Swim Camp schedule.
The document shows a camp day that still runs from 8:00 a.m. to nearly 5:00 p.m. Children swim in a morning block and an afternoon block. Much of the rest of the day is spent out of the water: dryland conditioning, scooter-board relays, team cheers and mascot design, an aluminum-foil boat challenge, a daily block of Olympic video clips, a trivia game, crafts, and a swim movie. The activities now carry swim-themed names. A relay race renamed for a swim stroke is still a relay race. The Department wrote that this camp could satisfy the single-focus exemption only if its operating hours were restricted to swim lessons and pool time. On the face of this document, they are not.
If this is the schedule SwimRVA filed, it confirms the finding at the center of this case: this is a day camp, and the law required a license before it opened. Our requests to the Department stand — release the complete Final Compliance Plan, verify any revised schedule through unannounced on-site inspections while children are in the water, and require SwimRVA to obtain a license before operating a summer camp at any campus.
Watch Melissa Hipolit's reporting on CBS 6 News and WTVR.com. Have something for Melissa to investigate? Email her.
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