Saturday, March 25, 2000
Dollar by dollar, YMCA fund grows
All of Switzerland Co. involved
BY MARK SCHMETZER
Enquirer contributor
VEVAY — The brief note in the local paper brought tears to the eyes of Sarah Brichto.
“It said that the Fredonia Baptist Church was donating the proceeds of its hymn sing to the YMCA,” said Mrs. Brichto, president of the Switzerland County YMCA board of directors. “They collected $118, but they rounded it up to $200.”
That kind of act convinces Mrs. Brichto that she's on the right track as she and other members of the board oversee two fund-raising campaigns designed to get a YMCA facility up and running.
One is a capital campaign that they hope will produce the $3.5 million needed to build the facility on an 8-acre site at Ind. 56 and 129. Plans call for the building to include an indoor swimming pool, a gym and other fitness facilities; a family resource center to serve as a home for service agencies; and a snack bar, Mrs. Brichto said.
“The indoor pool is the main thing,” she said. “That's what most people wanted. There is no public swimming pool in the county. We did a survey of high school students, and the majority of them responded that, yes, they do know how to swim but, no, they've never had lessons.”
The capital campaign still is $1 million short, she added.
“We got a nice surprise from the county commissioners and council when they voted to give us a percentage of the revenue from riverboat casinos, basically forever,” she said. The casinos should generate enough revenue to produce at least $100,000 annually for the YMCA, Mrs. Brichto said, which was enough to convince the county to approve a loan of $1 million to go along with a $1 million grant from the Indiana Department of Commerce and $500,000 from the Lilly Endow ment.
The land, valued at $300,000, was donated by the Vevay/Switzerland County Foundation, which was created by multimillionaire county native Paul Ogle.
The other fund-raising project is the Founders Campaign, which is required by the YMCA of all prospective new facilities as a way of measuring community involvement. Local organizations are expected to raise at least $250,000 to pay for the first three years of operation. The Founders Campaign Committee, led by Dr. Robert Fin dley and including Chuck Overbey, who also is executive director of the Vevay/Switzerland County Foundation, has raised $150,000, Mrs. Brichto said.
A North Avondale native, Mrs. Brichto and her husband, Herschel, moved to Vevay 10 years ago when their son Eric was 2 years old. That's when she started looking into the possibility of getting a YMCA built in the county. She had to put it on hold after giving birth to a second son, Joseph, but she was ready when interest was recently renewed.
“People have been looking into this kind of thing for decades,” she said. “Switzerland County is one of the five fastest-growing counties in the state.
“We're still looking around for the other million dollars,” she added. “If anybody wants to give us a million dollars, we'll take it.”
For more information about the Switzerland County YMCA, call (812) 427-9622 (427-YMCA).
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