New York pools operate under Subpart 6-1 of the State Sanitary Code, enforced by your county health department. This is a plain-language walkthrough of the recordkeeping obligations, with the regulation text quoted and linked so you can check it yourself.
Reviewed 2026-07-24 · Official text
A full report of any injury or illness incident at the pool goes to your permit-issuing official within 24 hours, and a notation is recorded in a log book. This covers incidents resulting in death, requiring resuscitation, requiring referral for medical attention, or bather illness associated with water quality.
A full report of any injury or illness incident occurring at a swimming pool shall be reported by the pool owner/operator to the permit-issuing official within 24 hours of its occurrence, and a notation recorded in a log book.
10 NYCRR §6-1.7
pH and free and total chlorine (or bromine) are tested and recorded at the beginning, during, and at the end of every swimming period — not once a day. Chlorinated pools hold pH between 7.2 and 7.8, and a free chlorine residual of 5.0 mg/l or a pH of 8.2 may not be exceeded.
Tests shall be conducted and recorded for pH and free and total chlorine or bromine residual at the beginning, during, and at the end of each swimming period.
10 NYCRR §6-1.11
Complete daily operation records are kept for each pool on forms approved or furnished by the State Commissioner of Health, and a copy stays at the facility for 12 months. Pools larger than 3,000 square feet, or disinfected with gas chlorine, must be maintained by a qualified swimming pool water treatment operator.
Complete daily operation records shall be kept of the operation of each swimming pool on forms approved or furnished by the State Commissioner of Health. Upon completion, a copy of such records shall be maintained at the facility for 12 months.
10 NYCRR §6-1.21
You maintain a written pool safety plan covering daily bather supervision, injury prevention, and how staff react to emergencies and incidents. It is approved by the permit-issuing official and kept on file at the pool.
Operators of swimming pools must develop, update and implement a written pool safety plan, consisting of procedures for daily bather supervision, injury prevention; reacting to emergencies, injuries, and other incidents, providing first aid and summoning help.
10 NYCRR §6-1.23
Supervision staff hold current certification in aquatic injury prevention and emergency response, issued by the American Red Cross or another certifying agency accepted by the State Commissioner of Health. A certification that has quietly lapsed is a supervision gap.
Plain-language summary of published regulations, not legal advice. Requirements vary by facility class and are enforced by your county health department — confirm current obligations with your permit-issuing official.
Software does not make you compliant — people and process do. What it can do is make the record a by-product of the work instead of a second job done afterwards from memory.
Guards record pH and chlorine on the deck where they take them. Each entry is timestamped and attributed, so the log is built as the day happens rather than transcribed afterwards.
Records stay searchable for the retention period and past it. Producing last July means a date filter, not a trip to a storage room.
Every lifeguard and instructor record carries its certification expiry, so a lapse surfaces weeks ahead while a recert can still be scheduled.
An incident report filed when it happens gives you the 24-hour report and the log-book notation from one entry — and it is still accurate a year later.
Scheduling and the compliance record live in the same system, so the staffing picture for any given afternoon is part of the history rather than a separate memory.
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