Pawtucket, RI Swimming Pools & Spas: Fencing & Safety Requirements (2026)

Section 410-58E puts the fencing duty on 'every person owning land on which there is located a swimming pool, whether or not containing any water,' who must erect and maintain an enclosure or fence sufficient to make the pool inaccessible to small children. The enclosure, including its gates, must stand no less than four feet and no more than six feet above the ground. For aboveground pools, a perimeter safety railing around the pool structure itself does not satisfy this requirement; the code still requires a separate fence or enclosure around the property or pool area.

Every gate must be self-latching, with the latch mounted at least four feet above the ground or otherwise placed out of a small child's reach, and every gate must be lockable. Ladders on elevated pools must be removable, and Subsection E requires the ladder to be taken down or raised whenever the pool is not in use, closing off the one entry point a perimeter fence alone would not cover. Subsection F layers on an inner protective fence at least three feet high around in-ground pools specifically, in addition to the four-to-six-foot outer enclosure, and requires every in-ground pool to keep rescue equipment on hand: at least one twelve-foot pole fitted with a shepherd's crook and one fifteen-inch life ring with a fifty-foot rope.

Subsection D separately bars any overhead electrical conductor from running directly over the pool, its apron or its fence, and requires nearby metal fences, enclosures or railings to be grounded against becoming electrically live from a broken conductor.