When Alan Mogridge’s father was the executive director of the Bangor YMCA in Maine, he oversaw the Y’s renovations, which led to a huge increase in membership.
Mogridge, the new executive director at the Valley YMCA in Ansonia, hopes the organization’s newly completed renovations will lead to the same thing.
Dignitaries and civic leaders from around the lower Naugatuck Valley towns gathered Tuesday at the Valley YMCA to officially recognize the completion of the project.
The event was billed as the Y’s “Grand Reopening,” although the facility never closed for more than a day during the construction period.
Ansonia Mayor James Della Volpe joined Mogridge, YMCA board Chairman Martha Dulla and board member Bill Purcell, also executive director of the Greater Valley Chamber of Commerce, for a ribbon-cutting in the Y’s new free weight strength center.
“It’s a new day at the Valley YMCA,” said Mogridge, reciting the Y’s new slogan.
The Valley YMCA currently has about 1,500 individual members, through 700 unit memberships, some of them individuals and some families. Its members are drawn from Ansonia, Derby, Oxford, Seymour and Shelton.
“I would like 4,000 or 5,000,” Mogridge said.
He knows that isn’t a pipe dream, because his father achieved a similar member increase, tripling the Bangor Y’s members to about 4,500.
Does the Y have enough room at its headquarters at 12 Bridge St. for that many people?
It does, Mogridge said, as long as they don’t all come at the same time.
“This is the first phase in reviving the Valley YMCA for the Valley community,” Mogridge said.
The Valley YMCA also has a childcare facility on Howard Avenue, shared with the Boys and Girls Club, at which it runs the Y’s preschool, kindergarten and school readiness programs.
Dulla, a board member for seven years, said the board knew the organization needed a revival because the word they heard around town was that it had a tired, old building.
“We didn’t want that reputation,” she said.
The first step was to merge with the Central Connecticut Coast YMCA, an association of YMCAs from Branford to Fairfield.
That gave the Valley YMCA access to additional resources to begin the renovation program.
Contractors were hired to paint the interior. The old fitness room was transformed into a new wellness center, with new exercise machines and expanded floor space. And a former racquetball court was converted into the new strength center.
Della Volpe noted that he is a member and works out at the facility.
“On behalf of the City of Ansonia, I’d like to congratulate you and your talented staff,” he told Dulla and Mogridge. “You’ve done a terrific job and I wish you nothing but the best.”
Purcell called the new executive director, who took over leadership of the Valley YMCA in March, as “the newest leader in our community.”
Mogridge said the next step is to invite more people to the YMCA as prospective members.
“We’d like to make it known that we’re the new Y in town, and we’d like people to come by and check us out,” he said.
