Yelm mayor Joe DePinto announced Friday, Nov. 17 that he met with Kyle Kronk, CEO of South Sound YMCA, to discuss the possibility of a YMCA branch in Yelm.
In a Facebook post, DePinto said that Kronk showed him, along with Yelm City Administrator Todd Stancil, renderings of what a Yelm branch YMCA would look like and a timetable. He wrote that a YMCA in Yelm could take about two years until it is funded, built and open to the public.
The renderings included two swimming pools — one lap and one activity, a space for the Yelm Historical Museum and the Yelm Timberland Library, a full-sized basketball court, workout area, break-out activity rooms and space for a medical partner. The City of Yelm has been looking for a place to re-house both the library and the museum, and the YMCA could be a likely suitor.
DePinto wrote that a possible YMCA in Yelm would be around the same size as the Briggs YMCA in Olympia, if not bigger.
“I’m excited about how real this is getting,” DePinto wrote on Facebook.
The YMCA will make a presentation to the Yelm City Council at its 6 p.m. meeting on Dec. 12, where it will outline the next steps to bringing a YMCA to Yelm.
