Regina swim club scrambles to find facilities for practices after YMCA closures

The sudden closure of two YMCA locations in Regina has a local swim club splashing around trying to find a place to practise.

"My heart sunk because our team has been associated with the YMCA since 1967, and it was our primary training location," said Jeralyne Manweiler, vice-president of the Regina Marlins Swim Club. 

"We are an active, community-based small club. And to lose that space and that time is going to prove extremely difficult for us to mitigate."

The YMCA announced Monday evening that the location on Victoria Avenue E., near Gardiner Park, will close for good on Friday, and the downtown location on 13th Avenue will close on Monday, Nov. 23.

"It was quite shocking that it happened that quickly," Manweiler said..

"Not just our group, but all of the user groups and all the community groups based out of the YMCA weren't given the consideration of more time to help them plan the next steps."

Steve Compton, CEO of the YMCA of Regina, said the organization has faced rising building and capital costs for several years, in addition to decreased revenue in the health and fitness space.

Then the COVID-19 pandemic hit. Total membership dropped 53 per cent since March, he said.

Compton said the YMCA had to shut down some operations in order to save other programming like child care.

"The losses just became too difficult to sustain without making a tough decision, or decisions, in this case, to make sure that the Y's presence [remained] in the community long term with our child care, our fitness facilities and our community programs to charity. "

Compton said child care will continue at the downtown location until it can relocate to another space.

"Between Regina and Moose Jaw, we serve over 500 licensed childcare spaces," he said. "And our before and after school programs, our youth mentoring, all the different programs we are able to continue."

Manweiler said the abrupt closure means some of her club's swimmers won't be able to go to the pool.

"We've suspended our non-competitive swimmers and our Mini-Marlins groups, because we simply don't have the time for them until we can figure out somewhere to get them to swim," she said, adding the club hopes to find times in other facilities by January. 

"If we had had more time and more leeway, we could have put some contingencies in place. We could have started reaching out and trying to find a solution for this. But we weren't given that opportunity."

Regina District Chamber of Commerce CEO John Hopkins said the YMCA closures were a shock, but he acknowledged the downtown building was old and the maintenance costs were high.

"And at the end of the day, a non-profit has to operate the same way as a for-profit business," said Hopkins. Even a non-profit can't lose money year after year and expect to keep the doors open," he said.

"It's sad, because that's something that's been there for so, so long.… So many people have used that facility in various ways, and it'll be sad to see it close."

Hopkins said there needs to be a discussion at the city, provincial and federal levels on how to keep institutions like the YMCA from closing.

"These are important amenities to all of us as Canadians from coast to coast to coast. And so we need to have a national discussion, or provincial or local discussion, about what's the future, particularly for organizations that have been around for 100 years."

Manweiler said the closures highlight the lack of recreational facilities in the city.

"Maybe it will bring to the attention of the city that they really need to invest more money in recreational and community facilities in this city," Manweiler said.

"There just aren't enough. If you go to other comparable sized cities with Regina, you can see way more facilities and more updated facilities. And it just seems like there needs to be a conversation about this."

In the meantime, the Marlins will look for more times to swim at the Lawson Aquatic Centre and other pools.

Compton said the downsizing may help position the YMCA to take part in future recreation facilities.

"We've put ourselves in a situation to talk about opportunities that we were previously involved in around shared use facilities or municipal partnerships."

The YMCA location on Rochdale Boulevard, in the northwest part of Regina, will remain open.