Germantown YWCA files for bankruptcy amid charges of mismanagement
First of two parts
by JAMES STURDIVANT
In the course of its 140-year history, the Germantown Woman's Y of Philadelphia has weathered financial ups and downs, dramatic shifts in demographics and the storms of the civil rights movement and integration. Saddled with debt and suffering from a steep drop in membership, the institution now faces its greatest challenge: Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
The filing comes at the end of a turbulent period during which it is alleged that money was provided for capital improvements that never occurred, funds for payroll dried up and grants earmarked for a summer camp program were diverted. The institution has also seen two board takeovers in the last five years.
The Y, which is not affiliated with YWCA USA, reported in its Aug. 31 bankruptcy filing that it is $540,000 in debt. It employs 26 people and runs a variety of programs, including a child care center, theater school, computer lab, classes in art, dance and pottery and a program for AIDS patients.
Interim executive director Merrie Baldus said that most of the debt was discovered last fall when a new board of directors took over following the resignation of former executive director Antoinette Berger. Lawyers with Deckert LLP are working pro bono with forensic accountants to trace the cash flow, she said.
The Germantown Woman's Y is reported to be the third oldest YWCA in the world. In the 1920s, it became the only one to integrate before the civil rights movement, board member Joyce Brown said.
"It's a unique historical place, and we want those who were part of our past to be part of our present," Brown said. ""We can make it a bright, beautiful place. We need angels," she said.
Fixing the Y's myriad problems, however, will be an uphill climb.
Legacy of mismanagement
The Y's main gymnasium features soaring windows and colorful paintings of athletes on its side walls. The paint, however, is flaking off, and many of the windowpanes are broken, requiring the windows to be covered in plastic in order to keep out the elements. The once-beautiful hardwood floor is covered in white dust.
Standing in the gym last week, Brown tells a troubling tale of $150,000 raised toward the $210,000 needed to fix the gym, of the work being stopped unexpectedly and pipes bursting last winter, warping the floor.
"What happened to the money?" she asks.
It's one of several instances in which well-intentioned efforts to repair facilities were thwarted. State Representative Rosita Youngblood, who said she tried "three times" to coordinate extensive repair efforts at the Y, said she had given up for the time being on trying to get state money
"One of the things I did do was contact the building trades unions about volunteering some work to bring it up to code. We did an entire walk through, listing everything that needed to be done," Youngblood said. She said that the Y did not follow through on meeting the criteria for state grants that would have paid for supplies.
"I can't make people do things," she said.
According to Brown, the Y's current problems go back to the '90s, when the institution racked up significant debt, ran an unlicensed child care facility for eight years and was discovered to have spent all of a $25,000 grant for a summer camp program before the camp began. The board or directors voted in 1999 to sell the building and dissolve the Y, which prompted a volunteer group, led by Brown, to call a special meeting and vote the entire board out. The new leadership raised $60,000 "in the first 60 days," she said, and sought to hire a full-time executive director.
What was meant to be new beginning, however, merely hastened the downward spiral.
Story to be continued next week.
Chestnut Hill Local staff reporter Michael J. Mishak did most of the reporting for this piece.
