Pictured is John Barber, vice president of operations for the Jamestown Young Men’s Christian Association, presenting the YMCA’s grant application request to members of the Jamestown Local Development Corporation. The YMCA is requesting $1 million in funding toward the construction of a new YMCA facility to replace the current building, which is almost 100 years old.

The Jamestown Young Men’s Christian Association is asking for a $1 million grant from the Jamestown Local Development Corporation toward the construction of a new YMCA facility in the community.

The YMCA’s grant application is under the Nonprofit Assistance Program. The City Council allocated $1.5 million in American Rescue Plan Act funding to help local nonprofit organizations in Jamestown.

John Barber, vice president of operations for the Jamestown YMCA, and Tom Benson, chairman of the YMCA committee, presented an overview of the YMCA’s request to JLDC members during the committee’s recent meeting.

“We’ve submitted a proposal, and many of you have certainly seen that the YMCA has an endeavor to build up a new YMCA facility,” Barber said. “The reasons for that are pretty simple. If you’ve been to the YMCA, a short walk around the space will tell you pretty quickly the space has aged. In fact, you can walk and see the cornerstone and see that the building was built in 1929, so we’re approaching a 100-year-old building.”

Barber said the YMCA views the proposal as a unique opportunity that comes at a time when the city has received additional funding to help the local community. He added that the city and the community have the opportunity to make an investment that can “propel” the YMCA forward.

With roots going back to 1858, Barber said the YMCA has endured through many difficult times, such as wars, recessions and periods of inflation. Barber acknowledged that the recent COVID-19 pandemic significantly impacted the operations of the YMCA, forcing the organization to close portions of its operation.

“Our fitness centers closed; we saw our membership reduced, but the real secret about the YMCA was revealed during the pandemic because when fitness centers had to close, guess who was still there with open programming? The YMCA,” he said. “We were still there providing emergency and essential childcare facilities, we were providing meals, we were delivering meals, we were changing even some things that we did in order to be able to meet community needs during that time. While many places were actually shut down, there were many of our staff who actually worked through the entire pandemic because the community still needed the Y.”

In his request for funding toward the YMCA’s project, Barber referenced how the community “came together” in 1929 to build a new YMCA facility. He described the grant funding opportunity as an “invitation” and a way for the city to invest in the YMCA to ensure that it is prepared for the next crisis to face the local community.

“We’re actually asking for an unprecedented investment in some ways into something that when, or if, and as challenges face our community, the Y will be there. We will be there for the next 100 years.”

After outlining the YMCA’s request for funding, Barber shared some of the ways the YMCA has been able to impact the community over the past year. During 2022, Barber said 634 children participated in afterschool, summer day camp and special family events. According to Barber, 199 teenagers participated in the YMCA’s free afterschool program at the teen center, 223 children worked with volunteer coaches in the youth basketball leagues and 102 children participated in the YMCA’s summer learning program that was designed to help narrow gaps in academic achievement.

Additionally, Barber shared that the YMCA served over 67,000 meals and over 12,000 snacks at 24 locations to 1,300 different youth during 2022. Barber also said that 53% of the YMCA’s members have some form of subsidized membership.

Currently, Baber said the YMCA is planning a Walk with Ease program and a Blood Pressure Prevention program for community members, as well as other community programs.

“We just recently started a recent partnership with The Resource Center for their day programs to actually come and utilize the Y every Monday morning, which means that then a population that actually is at risk of certain health factors actually now have access to our pools, our group exercise and our fitness every single week, he said.

While Barber acknowledged that the YMCA’s funding request of the is “large,” he believes the city’s investment could have a “long-lasting effect” by helping the YMCA continue to impact the community through various programs.

Following Barber’s portion of the presentation, Benson shared the financial details of the $30 million YMCA construction project, which the YMCA leadership team has been working on for more than two years.

Currently, Benson said the YMCA has about $4 million in committed funds from local and regional foundations. However, the project has faced a major roadblock with regard to state funding for the new YMCA facility.

“We met with state officials two or three times talking about the project,” he said. They’re very familiar with Jamestown and were very involved in the Comedy Center project. They like the project very much, they want to be able to fund the project, but they said you have to come back when you have more of something in the bag to show us that there’s local commitment to the project.”

Benson shared that the YMCA approached the state a second time following the commitments from local foundations; however, without a commitment from the city, the state indicated that it would “very difficult” for the YMCA to receive state funding for the project.

“Basically, with no commitment of any of the American Rescue Plan Act funds into the project, the state rejected our application,” he said. “We asked for five point something million; they said zero, so that put us back to where we are now. Raising $30 million is a process where you have to be able to point to a success to the next place, to the next place, to the next place. It’s great to say we have $4 million of commitment from the local foundations, which is a lot, that’s a big number, but we have three or four other sources of funding lined up, but we have to be able to go back to them and say now we have the city commitment, not just with a letter, but with skin in the game.”

Moving forward, Benson said the YMCA is going to host a local fundraising campaign and has requested $2 million through the federal government’s earmark program. He described the new facility’s fundraising status as a “pyramid of funding” that can quickly add up to the total need by the YMCA with the right steps.

“Absolutely key to that right now is for the city of Jamestown to step up and understand that this isn’t a million dollars, this equals a lot more than that,” he said. “It equals the state’s commitment probably, and it allows us to move forward, because right now we’re kind of stuck in the mud. Unless we can get some kind of impetus to move this thing to the next step, we’re in trouble.”

Benson also explained to JLDC members that the “clock is ticking” on the current YMCA facility. While Benson and Barber believe the building can be utilized by other organizations in the future, they indicated that the current YMCA facility is not “sustainable” for its current usage. Although Benson shared that the bailout money received by the YMCA has helped keep the current facility going, he warned that in the “not too distant future” the YMCA will not be able to continue operating at its outdated facility.

“For the future of this community and all the other stuff we’re trying to do to bring young people back to this place, without a Y, especially a full-body Y, like what we’re talking about here, it just creates a big hurdle to that whole process,” Benson said. “Hopefully, we can get the commitment from the city to get the ball rolling and move this thing forward and to allow us to leverage to the next bunch of steps, because it’s crucial.”