Shift in demographics prompts the closures of YMCAs around city

Monday, August 21, 2006 LORAIN, Ohio (AP) — The Torpedoes youth team used to swim here. The Lorain Family YMCA also was home to computer classes and exercise-seeking adults — until it drained its pool and locked its doors. Locals were surprised to find a short note taped to a front window last February, telling members when and how they could empty their gym lockers. A similar scene unfolded at the YMCA in Elyria, the next town over. The closures have left a hole in two communities that, like the rest of northern Ohio, have suffered economic hardship in recent years. In nearby Cleveland, another YMCA organization has shut down three full-facility branches in recent years to adjust for declining membership and fewer donations and monthly fees, while reopening newer, more modern facilities in well-to-do communities. "I knew they had financial problems, but it was very unexpected, the way it happened so quickly," said Bonnie Ivancic, an Elyria City Council member whose children learned to swim at the Elyria YMCA. Months later, Lorain County officials are talking of buying the Lorain and Elyria buildings to establish a recreation department, while some former members drive to YMCAs in neighboring towns or to private health clubs. Others do without. 19th century mandate Some are asking whether the local YMCA organizations are living up to the agency's 19th century mandate to serve the poor. "They've disinvested in the city of Cleveland. They had this mission of fostering healthy lifestyles and a Christian mission of helping low income people, and at the end of the day, it was about the bottom line," said Matt Zone, a Cleveland councilman who served on a task force to keep one YMCA branch in a residential neighborhood from closing. YMCAs operate as independent organizations, responsible for their own finances. Making ends meet was a 30-year battle for the Elyria YMCA, said John Bobel, a former president. The power company threatened to shut off electricity at least once, and the YMCA missed Social Security payments for employees, he said. Every few years, someone in the community would step in and make up the YMCA's shortfalls. Several years ago, the Elyria and Lorain organizations merged to streamline administrative costs. "We paid off the building at one point, but within a year, we were back in debt," Bobel said. "In our case, it frankly would have been better to have lived in a community that is flush with cash." More awareness about health in the last 20 years has prompted many members of the middle class to join private health clubs. That has left YMCAs short on membership dues that had for years kept the organizations afloat financially and enabled YMCAs to issue free memberships to the poor, Bobel said. Anne Molnar of Lorain remembers the old YMCA on 28th Street, the one that served as a boarding house for railroad workers before giving way to the more recent facility in the 1970s. That facility had an Olympic-sized pool and a basketball court, both indoors. "We don't have any indoors recreation for the children in the winter time and that's a shame," she said. "We're one of the largest cities in Ohio and I cannot fathom this city without a Y." The task force in Cleveland tried in 2003 to save a branch that had been in operation since 1902 but had seen its membership dwindle to half of what it had been in the 1990s. The group set out to raise money to renovate the neoclassical building and came up with plans to increase membership and programming. The branch was closed in 2004. Chris Warren, former co-chairman of the task force, and others believe the YMCA of Greater Cleveland saw the closure as an opportunity to pay off debts by selling the building for more than $1 million. The organization lost $2.3 million in 2003 and used endowment funds to operate branches in 2003 and 2004. Two years later, the Cleveland YMCA is closing its Brooklyn branch and selling the building. It operates nine other full-facility branches with pools and gyms in Cuyahoga County, including one downtown facility renovated in 1996 and described by some as a "palace." Spokeswoman Audra Kessler said the organization has continued with its child care programs and the closures of the full facilities were a natural reaction to the Cleveland area's shifting demographics. Population Census figures show Cleveland's population dropped from 480,000 in 2000 to about 414,000 in 2005. Surrounding suburbs in Cuyahoga County have also lost population, but at a slower rate. The Department of Housing and Urban Development has said that Cleveland's "legacy of urban flight" includes a city poverty rate of 28 percent. As part of his work for the task force, Warren looked for other cities with changing or declining inner city population. "We tried to answer the question: Is it true that Ys can't compete in inner cities? And we found that isn't an inevitable reality. Chicago, Pittsburgh and St. Louis have stable, thriving central city examples," he said. In Lorain County, the YMCA of Greater Cleveland held a public forum in July to gauge support for opening a smaller facility in Amherst — one with gym equipment and cardiovascular machines but no pool or gymnasium. That's good news for people such as Molnar, who still carries her YMCA card. "I'm not giving up on it yet," she said. "I still have hope we can open another one."