Cleveland Avenue YMCA Opens Year-Round Indoor Pool

Wednesday was an exciting day for families in west Montgomery.
Cleveland Avenue YMCA officials debuted a brand new, multi-million dollar heated pool.

For more than a year, construction continued before leaders were able cut the ribbon on the $2 million dollar project.

Caroline Tyynisma– one of the kids at the Y– bravely took a dive, not knowing how she would feel coming out.

“Like it felt the perfect temperature when you wanna jump into a pool. It wasn’t too hot, wasn’t too cold,” Tyynisma said.

President of the YMCA of the Greater Montgomery Gary Cobbs says the goal is to offer a safe place for kids in the community to get exercise in a fun way. But he says they are keeping safety a priority.

“One of the tragic things that we know is that drowning is the second leading cause of children ages 1 to 14. There’s a high concentration in minority kids that drown as well. And so we want to make sure that as a YMCA we’re doing what we can to prevent drownings in our community,” Cobbs said.

Cobbs also said they’re also planning to work with Montgomery Public School System to help teach young students how to swim.

“We’re going to be offering safe around water classes, learn to swim classes for our community,” Cobbs said.

Along with the five-foot deep pool, the expansion includes locker rooms and an aquatics office.

“I started to get like, the understand of why we’re doing this and what is the cause of us doing it. I had fun,” Jacari Johnson said.

“I think it’s really important because so that everyone can get together and have fun, and it can bring the community closer to each other,” Dylan Tyynismaa said.

After the ribbon cutting, YMCA officials kicked off an annual fundraising campaign to raise money for scholarships.
The scholarships are going to those who otherwise couldn’t afford to enroll in the YMCA program.

The Cleveland Avenue YMCA and City of Montgomery officials cut the ribbon Wednesday on a new indoor pool. The pool will be open year-round. In addition, male and female locker rooms and an aquatic office will be added.