How to start a YMCA: Tips from Grove, Okla.
Posted on Friday, May 19, 2006
URL: http://www.nwanews.com/brog/News/34868/
BENTONVILLE — Grove, Okla., started working on getting a YMCA four years ago.
Last September, the storefront facility opened in the city’s former library, with a simple fitness center and a studio for exercise classes.
Bill Skea, chairman of the Grove YMCA Board of Directors, has been with the project from the beginning. Like Bentonville, the Grove YMCA is under the umbrella of the Freeman Family Southwest YMCA in Neosho, Mo.
But in Skea’s mind, Grove is just getting started. Before opening the storefront YMCA, the organization started a summer camp last year for elementary-school children. The camp was held at a Grove elementary school. That camp led to an afterschool program serving 10 to 15 children each day. "Because this community is a retirement community, we’re also trying to provide exercise classes for older people 55 and up to keep them active," Skea said, citing retirement areas around Grand Lake of the Cherokees. Members of the community requested a swimming pool for adults and children, and daycare for seniors with dementia. In the beginning, organizers doubted the community’s financial support, even though there was a great deal of interest. But the financial backing has been plentiful. Instead of raising a recommended $300,000 for a three-year start-up period, the leaders set a goal of $460,000. Just since September 2004, they’ve raised $420,000, Skea said. Those funds helped find a location, hire a program director, cover operating costs for a few years and attract members — all first steps in the YMCA process.
Grove uses Neosho management, accounting, and record-keeping capabilities, as well as other benefits. Skea expects help from Neosho for another five to eight years, then Grove will have its own building and break away. Grove will start a capital campaign in a few years.
Bentonville is particularly poised to be successful because of the visible corporations based here, Skea said. "Possibly, they would be interested in corporate-type memberships for encouraging their employees to work out," he said.
The YMCA offers benefits beyond fitness, laughed Skea, a full-time volunteer there. "If you spend time there, it kind of becomes a family," he said. "It’s to improve your physical health, but also you begin to develop a community."