NEW HANOVER – The YMCA of Southeastern NC is knocking on government doors seeking funding to fuel a $15-million expansion of its midtown location.
READ MORE: YMCA seeks rezoning of 53 acres in northern part of county
New Hanover Republican state representative Ted Davis Jr. recently submitted a bill to the General Assembly requesting state funding to support it. Introduced on March 31, House Bill 586, titled “YMCA Expansion Funding,” proposes to appropriate $2 million from the state general fund for the expansion and currently is in the House committee on appropriations.
Davis said he proposed the bill after president and CEO of YMCA Southeastern NC Dick Jones reached out to him for the state’s support.
“I was with the YMCA when I was a young boy,” Davis said. “I just think the YMCA is a great organization, number one, and it really, I think, does a lot to serve our community. If this expansion comes to fruition, I think it’s really going to help the people in that area, adults as well as children.”
H.B. 586 has received support from both sides of the aisle in the House, with Democratic Rep. Deb Butler joining the Republican sponsor of the bill. She told Port City Daily she has been a fan of the Y for 50 years.
“Ever since winning the most improved golfer award at Camp Cheerio in 1972!” Butler said. “In all seriousness, the good work done by the Y has stood the test of time. I am pleased to support their expanded footprint to better serve more of our citizens. I am hopeful that our bipartisan support will result in some financial support from Raleigh.”
The YMCA already received $4 million in grant funding for the midtown expansion from the New Hanover Community Endowment in December of 2023. The YMCA matched the Endowment’s investment, bringing current funding to $8 million.
Representatives of the YMCA Southeastern NC are scheduled to present a formal funding request of $1 million to Wilmington City Council during its next agenda meeting on April 15.
As well, the YMCA requested $1.5 million from New Hanover County in January and issued a second request on March 28, according to internal emails. YMCA representatives plan on giving a formal presentation to commissioners on its plans, but a meeting date has not yet been set. County commissioners Bill Rivenbark, Stephanie Walker and Rob Zapple previously took a tour of the midtown location last winter.
“The place is bursting at the seams, there’s clearly a need for this,” Zapple told Port City Daily. “They don’t have to do a whole lot of talking to show the need that they have. Right now, they just need to increase their capacity.”
Currently, the midtown location, located at 709 George Anderson Dr., serves about 1,200 members. During soccer and basketball seasons, the campus fills up with 1,300 youth and their families.
According to estimations from the Y, the expanded facility would provide access to 6,000 additional members, including 1,800 seniors. Jones said it would help improve the facility’s current childcare services by 50%; the YMCA currently serves over 1,500 children across the Wilmington metropolitan area.
“We do partner with a lot of school sites, a lot of churches and in our facility,” Jones said. “The midtown facility will see an expansion in the number of childcare areas and classrooms so that we’ll be able to serve more kids.”
One of the more prominent additions to the midtown location would be a new 25-yard, eight-lane indoor pool. The indoor pool would be suitable for local high-school swim-team competitions, a factor that Rivenbark said is also beneficial for the local economy.
“There’s not an Olympic size pool anywhere and, you know, some of the bigger markets, like Raleigh and Greensboro, Charlotte, that’s where they have all the swim meets,” Rivenbark stated. “My daughter plays travel soccer, and we would go to a soccer game, and I know how much money we spent when we went out of town, and these people would come to town and rent hotel rooms, buy things, go to the beach, eat in restaurants, so it’s a big plus.”
In addition, YMCA members would have access to lap swimming, water exercise classes, and swimming lessons. Jones said the indoor pool would help provide free water safety and swimming lessons for every second-grade student at New Hanover County Schools. The YMCA currently collaborates with the YWCA and the North Carolina Swim Foundation in the “Schools and Pools” program to provide students the opportunity to learn how to swim. According to data from Cape Fear Collective, New Hanover currently ranks in the top three counties for accidental drownings.
“We live right on the coast, we’re surrounded by water,” Zapple said. “It seems like a huge gap that we would have any child hitting the age 10 and not knowing how to swim or be familiar with the water. I know the YMCA does their part in that water education.”
The facility would also include what Jones calls an “airnasium.” The structure would be like a traditional gym but outside in an enclosed open-air concept. There will be a basketball court underneath, as well as pickleball courts.
“It’ll be an enclosed space from a fencing perspective, so that you can do what’s called futsal, indoor soccer, but you can play under that space,” Jones said. “One of the things we learned through COVID was the desire to do outside exercise and so there will be plenty of space there.”
According to Jones, the growth in the community spurred the initiative for expanded services. Since 2020, New Hanover’s population has risen by 7.8% according to US Census data.
“It’s a wonderful thing to see a community grow,” Jones voiced, but expressed it needed to “keep pace” with the area’s rise in residents. “One Y was great in the 1960s and 1970s, but one Y does not serve the community now that we are much bigger and much broader.”
According to Jones, the date for breaking ground on the midtown expansion depends on when they reach at least 75% of their $15-million goal. At the earliest, he estimated, by the end of summer.
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