EAST LIVERPOOL YMCA planning joint ventures

The city YMCA has about 2,000 members and 5,000 participants.
By NANCY TULLIS
VINDICATOR SALEM BUREAU
EAST LIVERPOOL -- YMCA of East Liverpool was to finalize plans today for a $12 million project creating two new sites for its 2,000 members.
Director Rob O'Hara said the YMCA will spend about $6 million -- $3 million at each location -- in joint ventures with East Liverpool City Hospital and Kent State University.
In the Calcutta area, the YMCA and the hospital will build a new wellness center -- a swimming, fitness and rehabilitation facility for YMCA members and therapy outpatients, O'Hara said. The YMCA board of directors has not yet announced the location of that facility, O'Hara said.
Construction is to begin sometime this summer, he said. The wellness center will include a warm-water therapy pool, a lap and family recreation pool, activity space for youth and teen programs, a multipurpose area for aerobics and community meetings, and the hospital's physical therapy offices.
How it started: O'Hara said the YMCA board began discussing new facilities about five years ago. About the same time, the hospital's board was considering its own building plans, he said.
After much discussion the YMCA board decided to put the building plans on hold and concentrate on building programs and membership, O'Hara said. He said the Y now has about 2,000 members, and 5,000 total participants. Membership had dropped to about 600, mostly due to lack of equipment and programs, he said.
The downtown Y is in a Fourth Street building constructed in 1921.
The YMCA will renovate and move into the former Kent State University fieldhouse, also on Fourth Street, about three blocks east, he said.
Renovation will begin almost immediately, and continue as the wellness center is under construction, he said.
Facility improvements: KSU will use the Fourth Street Y for physical education classes, O'Hara said. That facility will include a new water-park type family fun pool, racquetball courts, and an indoor climbing wall. Head Start preschool will also be located there, as will the Y's childcare program, and activity areas for youth and active older adult programs, O'Hara said.
He said having a YMCA facility in the Calcutta area will benefit residents of not only that community, but those farther north and east, such as Lisbon, Leetonia, Rogers and East Palestine.
Meanwhile, keeping a facility downtown will benefit city residents and those in Pennsylvania and West Virginia who use the Fourth Street facilities, he said.