The indoor rain that has plagued the Genoveva Chavez Community Center for the past decade has ceased for now.

Public Works Director Robert Romero, recently nominated for the job of city manager, said Monday that recent repairs on dehumidifying equipment in the pool area have put an end to the drips that caused recent closings of the basketball courts. The machines hadn't been operating since October, Romero said.

Whether the solution will be effective remains to be seen. Over the years, various fixes — from roof repairs to the installation of exhaust fans — have been employed in an effort to stop the leaks. But none permanently solved the problem at the 10-year-old south-side facility.

Sometimes the building is drip-free for months or even years, but inevitably the drips return.

The cause of the moisture problem inside the $25 million building has never been positively identified — despite the fact that the city of Santa Fe has spent about $12,000 on three different reports since 2006 trying to pinpoint the problem.

And there remains much debate about the cause, how to fix it and who should foot the bill.

The only thing officials involved do agree on is that the major components of the center — a giant ice-skating rink, multiple swimming pools and a massive two-story gymnasium — combine to create an environment that is complicated to maintain.

The most recent report commissioned by the city to diagnose the problem cites a number of contributing factors.

According to that report — completed in April 2009 by Christopher Alba at Environetics/Construction Analytics Inc. — the mechanical engineer appeared to have been "unfamiliar with the basic concepts in the ventilation and control of humidity in the natatoria," or pool area, and made mistakes that resulted in "condensation that has affected most of the building," according to the report.

The report also states that architect Ed Mazria "did not appear to understand the dynamics of vapor drive and how to protect building components," and made design errors that allowed moisture to enter the facility's walls and roof.

The third cause of the constant dripping from the center's ceilings, according to the report, was the city's "inability to successfully manage the environmental factors" within the building.

The report also mentions that the vapor barrier on the roof was inspected, and the contractor installed an inferior vapor barrier.

Mazria said in an interview that, in his opinion, only the third cause cited in the report has any validity.

Mazria said he knew when he designed the building that having a large body of warm water under the same roof as a large body of cold water would present challenges, and he included elements in his design to address those factors.

Those included a membrane on the roof to prevent moisture from "migrating around" and the incorporation of the best dehumidifying systems available at the time to ensure that the pool area was kept under constant "negative pressure," Mazria said.

Keeping the pool area under negative pressure, Mazria said, entails ensuring that warm, dry air is constantly being forced into the pool area so that no wet air can escape.

Mazria said his design called for three Dectron dehumidifying units — which cost about $210,000 each when the building was constructed 10 years ago — to maintain negative pressure in the pool area.

Fewer units likely could have done the job, Mazria said, but he incorporated some "built-in redundancy" into the system so that the negative pressure could be maintained even if one of the machines went down or needed repair.

"If the mechanical system in the building is properly maintained and operated, there should be no issue with moisture in the building," Mazria said.

But, he said, "it appears it hasn't been properly maintained for years."

The architect said he believes the city hasn't always retained qualified people to work on the sophisticated machines, resulting in continuous failures that have allowed warm, wet air to escape the pool area and move through the structure, forming condensation, which drips down into the building. Migrating chlorine fumes have also caused corrosion and rust in the building, according to several reports.

There appears to be some basis to Mazria's theory that the city did not properly maintain the machines, at least initially.

Facilities Division Director Martin Valdez said Friday that the city tried to maintain the equipment with city staff "for the first couple of years."

The building opened to the public in 2000, but didn't hire maintenance contractors for the machines until 2002.

Since then, the city has retained maintenance contractors.

But there have still been problems. Romero said the most recent system failure happened after a staff member, confused about the approach the city was taking to the problem, turned the maintenance contractor away when he came to work on the units in October.

Subsequently, two of the machines were down for several weeks, recently resulting in dripping from more than 90 sites within the gymnasium.

"I'll be the first to admit that our operations and maintenance hasn't been the best," Romero said. "We're not perfect and we've made some mistakes, but I think we are on the right track now."

A 2008 report by another firm ruled out roof leaks as a source of the moisture, but Alba's report said leaks in the flat part of the roof are "clearly visible."

The city mailed strongly worded letters to two roofing companies and general contractor Bradbury Stamm last week demanding that they come up with plans to remedy "the chronic roof system failures and resulting damage at the Genoveva Chavez Community Center" by Friday.

If they don't, the letter states, the city's legal department will begin a mandatory mediation process that would have to precede any litigation in the case.

Romero said the letters went out even though the drips have stopped, because roof leaks have been identified as one source of the drips in the past, and because of concerns about the adequacy of the vapor barrier.

Architect Mazria and the mechanical engineering firm P2RS Group couldn't be held financially accountable, even if it were determined that any fault lies in their work. The city made a deal with those parties in 2003 agreeing to release them from any future claims related to the building, according to a document on file at the city.

Mazria said the settlement was related to various change orders on the project, not the roof issue.

Robert Lepage, owner of Ex-El Co. Inc., the company that installed the flat portion of the building's roof, said he would be happy to remedy any issues with work performed by his company, but he doesn't believe there are any.

"I was a subcontractor for Bradbury Stamm, and I was subject to the scrutiny of Bradbury Stamm and the architect," Lepage said. "They inspected our work and paid me. Now, if I got paid in full and everybody approved what we did, why is it they are saying we did something wrong 10 years later?"

Lepage said it's also been difficult to work the problem out with the city because there are so many different points of contact and ideas about what should be done.

"That whole thing is a bureaucratic nightmare," Lepage said. "Nobody is in charge and nobody knows what to do, and everybody is pointing the finger at someone else."

Stephan E. Kovach IV, a partner in the firm Kovach Metal and Roof Wall Professionals — whose firm installed the sloped metal roof on the building — said he has had similar difficulties dealing with the city.

Kovach said he advised the city for the past three years to install monitoring stations that would allow the temperature and humidity inside the building to be tracked, not only by on-site maintenance staff but by off-site heating and cooling technicians on contract with the city.

He said the monitors were never installed.

The very first recommendation made in the 2009 report on the issue was that the city needed to install monitoring equipment to measure the temperature and humidity in the building.

But confusion remains over whether that was ever done.

Romero said "monitoring, monitoring, monitoring" is his new motto on how to manage the delicate systems at the center.

And documents received from the city indicate "one digital thermometer/humidity display" costing about $363 was installed in August.

But it's not clear if that is the type of monitoring system called for in the report. Romero said he didn't know.

Kovach estimated the monitoring system he was referring to would cost about $10,000, and he doesn't believe anything like it has been installed. "I don't think anyone wants to spend the money, or they don't have it," Kovach said.

Dennis Town, vice president of Bradbury Stamm Construction, said last week that he hadn't seen the letter from the city. Representatives from the company did not return follow-up calls seeking an update their position.

Contact Phaedra Haywood at 986-3068 or phaywood@sfnewmexican.com.