Almost one year after it almost closed its doors for good, the Sault Ste. Marie YMCA is seeking a new CEO and scrapping the idea of joining together with other northern Ontario Ys.
Just nine months ago, the Sault Y leadership made the difficult announcement that its McNabb Street building would soon close, leaving the status of hundreds of daycare clients up in the air.
"Where we are now from a year ago is obviously a very much better position and knowing how important we are to the community as a whole is helping sustain the YMCA and it's giving us the strength to make better decisions to move forward," said Sault Y board co-chair Chris Graham in an interview by phone.
The community rallied behind the Sault Y and an angel investor was found by way of the Lukenda Foundation, who purchased the organization's aging building, placing it in a better financial position and allowing the board to plan for the future of the Y in the Sault.
"If you look where we were a year ago, we were over a million dollars in debt with the mortgage, struggling for direction, wondering how we were going to keep the doors open," said Graham.
"Organizations and people and the city have stepped up in just massive ways that have made our decisions so much easier and given us so many more opportunities to to grow this Sault Ste. Marie YMCA," he added.
After the organization was put in a better place financially, Graham said the next steps were to strengthen the board and find new leadership.
"We invested quite a bit of time in pursuing an amalgamation with the YMCA of Northeastern Ontario, that would include Sudbury, North Bay and Timmins," said Graham.
Ultimately, the board decided against amalgamation and to instead remain as an independently-operated Y.
"We had to take a step back and reassess the situation, and ultimately, it came down to the decision that we need to secure our own leader and our own full-time CEO," said Graham.
Having the support of the YMCA of Northeastern Ontario had its advantages, but Graham said it also meant fees and uncertainty when it came to leadership.
"To have somebody in-house, who is gonna be there Monday to Friday, who is gonna be there interacting with the staff with the community — that was very important to us. And if we were going to be under the umbrella (of the YMCA of Northeastern Ontario), the question was who's gonna be in the building," said Graham.
That decision has lead to the Sault Y posting job ads for the position with a salary range of $130,000 to $150,000.
Graham said a new business plan has been presented to city staff and will be included in an upcoming meeting of city council.
Repairs have been completed on the roof and a new boiler for the building is expected to be installed in the near future. Graham said an engineering firm is helping with the tender for that project, which is going through the process of being funded through the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund.
"We have lots of funding coming our way to make the repairs to the building," he said.
At the same time, Graham says membership numbers are climbing.
"Our numbers are back to pre-closure levels, which is very encouraging to see and every every week we're adding more members," said Graham.
As a result of the work that has been done in the last year, Graham said a new CEO will be walking into an organization that is in much better financial shape and that has a great deal of support.
"The position that we will give the new CEO will be one of strength, with a backing of the city, of the Lukenda Foundation and the community," said Graham.