Staff Newsletter | Tuesday, July 19, 2022
“That they may all be one.” – John 17:21
For the past two months, most of the conversations taking place with leadership as well as the board of directors have touched on how we can best navigate the impact inflation is having on our Y. As you heard from Ed Bressette on last Friday’s Staying Connected call, everyday facility repairs have become much more costly. Ed pointed to the two critical facility projects that have been on the schedule for the Tom Taylor Y for quite some time, but due to supply chain challenges, we have been unable to acquire the necessary parts to complete the boiler and natatorium repairs. Along with the delay, though, is the escalating cost of the repairs. The natatorium project alone has increased from $1.2 million to $1.8 million over the past two years! It is important to note that were it not for our gallant facility maintenance teams, the costs would be even higher. The facility crews throughout our association exhibit extraordinary dedication and commitment on a daily basis, keeping our centers clean and well maintained; their hard work and expertise translate to thousands of dollars in cost savings. A big thank you to our valiant facility maintenance teams; you are a vital part of our success.
In addition to the challenges of rising costs to maintain our centers, managing the labor market has become every bit as challenging as well. For months, we have faced the excruciating reality that people are still not readily re-entering the job market, leaving us shorthanded in many critical areas (e.g., childcare, custodians, and maintenance techs, to name just a few). Due to the extraordinary work of Noor Bergman and Nat Nabass, though, we have begun to make great progress in our ability to attract new employees. Last week, Brian Flattum alerted me to the great news that our Early Learning Center could now offer more services to our families with the expansion of our staff team. He shared that Holly Tedford and the team have been super excited about the work of Jennifer Wroblos, who recently joined their team to lead our early learning center in University Place. In addition, the Child Care team has been able to add new staff, too, enabling them to begin preparing to open new childcare sites in September. This is extremely exciting and a tribute to the great collaboration between the human resources and child care departments. The impact of Noor’s and Nat’s contributions, along with the entire HR team, cannot be overstated. They have truly transformed our Y and put us in a position to persevere through some pretty severe challenges. It is also important to note the great work of James Van Eddy, who has spent long days interviewing the many candidates recruited by Noor and Nat. It has been a great team effort!
One of the big reasons we have seen an improvement in our ability to attract more candidates for our Child Care and Early Learning positions has been our ability to raise wages and provide improved benefits. (We made childcare services available to the staff as well.) Fortunately, we received a federal stabilization grant to help us fund increased wages, but it reinforced the truth that the market is dictating higher wages on a widespread scale. Over the past seven months, we have been diligently working to address the findings from the study conducted to assess our compensation package compared to the market. We have not deviated from the plan, and are implementing wage adjustments in phases. Currently, we are preparing ourselves for the next round of adjustments, determining what the next phase will be, in addition to rolling out a new medical, dental, and vision benefits package in September. As exciting as this is, it raises a serious question for us to answer: how does our Y cover the increased expenses related to employment? The logical area for us to consider increasing is our membership fees, which historically comprise 80% of our total revenue. We have not raised our rates over the past two years, but rather have been focusing our efforts on attracting more of our members back into the centers. We have done a great job to get it to 70% of pre-COVID numbers but, at least for now, membership has leveled off. Our philosophy throughout this time has been to remove all barriers (eliminating the joining fee and keeping rates steady) to make it as attractive as possible for people to enter our Y. In July, we saw 500 membership units put their accounts on hold, a result of the typical summer behavior or possibly a result of the recent increase in the number of reported cases of COVID. In either case, it is another indication of how difficult it has been to grow membership in this climate.
Given the severity of the current conditions, it has become necessary to consider raising our membership rates. We are also considering adding back a key component to our membership formula: the join fee. As Scott Smith points out, this will also enable us to reinstitute our hold fee, which will coincide perfectly with the implementation of the monthly virtual-only membership fee in October. This will create a great vehicle to keep our members connected if they need to step away from their membership. It also reopens an effective promotion strategy that allows us to extend a no-join-fee offer, something that has been extremely effective for our Y over the years. Increasing our fees has been something we have refrained from doing for two years, recognizing that our communities are also enduring hardships alongside not being at full strength as a Y. As one of our board members, Tony Panagiotu, stated: we can no longer refrain from raising rates, and if our members are struggling, we have the mechanism to help them. On this note, Megan Sala informed me that the membership team has worked to streamline the scholarship process, removing barriers and making the process more accessible to people.
Last month, we reported a positive net in our budget of nearly $900,000. This much-needed result for our association gave us a $300,000 positive net for the year. The question we need to ask, though, is whether this is a one-month occurrence or a trend? As you heard from Jared Johnson on the Staying Connected call, Day Camp continues to operate above the budget expectations. All of our camps are full with kids, which will give our budget a big boost. Unfortunately, at this point in the month, membership trails expectations. In addition, fundraising – another critical piece of our total revenue, and a big part of June’s positive report – is not as high as the previous month. We also know that the wage increases we instituted for lifeguards, custodians, group exercise instructors, maintenance techs, and swim instructors will kick in this month. The picture is beginning to take focus – the revenue is not strong enough to offset the upward pressure produced by wages. Though we gave increases of 3% last July and 2.75% this past January, as well as addressed many of the positions identified in the Milliman salary study, we are still behind the market in a number of other positions. We must stay the course in order to provide competitive compensation. As a result, we are planning to implement a membership fee increase in October. This is a very important step for our Y. I am confident it is the right one to make at this time.
For the past two years, we have pushed hard to rebuild our Y. I am proud of what we have accomplished. I am inspired to be a member of this team, seeing every one of our team members leaning in hard to make a contribution. I have been part of this Y for 39 years, but never have I experienced such commitment and determination from everyone in our association. We are One Y! Thank you all; you are amazing.
#OneY #StayStrong #StayWithUs