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YMCA Spots Troubling Community Trend

YMCA

The YMCA of Bloomington Normal is seeing a significant shift in income among those who use its programs.

"It continues to climb and we see probably about a 7 to 8% every year. And this has been typical for the last four years," according to Executive Director B.J. Wilken.

Wilken says this change is not only in the rising number of people seeking help paying for YMCA youth, after school, and mentorship programs.

"Exponentially what we're seeing is the amount of assistance that they need based upon the income that people are demonstrating they are earning in a year, we are awarding people in many cases 89 to 90% of the dues. The trends in years past seemed to be closer to 10 to 205 off," he said.

Wilken says part of this may come from better knowledge of programs at the Y, but the income shift is huge. He says the difference between the 10% subsidy and an 80% subsidy is about $20,000 in income per year.

Wilken says donors allow the Y to offer the help. The Y is in its annual fundraising campaign. The YMCA last year used donations to discount $178,000 in program fees to help nearly 2,100 people.  
 

WGLT Senior Reporter Charlie Schlenker has spent more than three award-winning decades in radio. He lives in Normal with his family.
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