Facility celebrates pool reopening

The sounds of happiness have returned to the Butte Family YMCA, and that is music to the ears of Colin Higgins.

“It didn’t feel like the Y for 2 months,” Higgins, a YMCA board member, said Friday afternoon. “Two weeks ago, when we had that buzzing in the pool again with the splashing and laughing, it was, awe, hallelujah.”

The Simperman Corrette Aquatics Center was closed for more than two months this spring as the YMCA had a new boiler system installed. The Y celebrated the reopening of the pool — and the 20 years the YMCA location has been open — during a ribbon cutting with the Butte Chamber of Commerce on Friday.

That state-of-the-art system cost the YMCA $150,000. Of that, $50,000 came from the Town Pump Charitable Foundation. Another $50,000 came from the Dennis and Phyllis Washington Foundation. The YMCA had to fundraise for the rest.

“We made it a challenge and threw it to the community,” YMCA CEO Stephanie Feist said. “I’m very blessed to announce that we matched that challenge.”

Then several children who take advantage of the programs offered by the YMCA in the pool helped cut the ribbon.

Higgins noted that the system, which can be controlled by a touch screen, will help ensure pool safety.

“It should have been installed like this 21 years ago,” he said. “What is in their now will be there in perpetuity.”

Feist pointed out that the Fritz Apostle third-grade water safety program had to be moved during the closure. The Riptide Swim Team had to practice at Montana Tech, and programs like water aerobics and the Y swimming program had to be temporarily relocated.

Feist thanked the local establishments — mostly hotels — who gave space for the programs, but said she did not want to mention them by name because she didn’t want others trying to hit up the businesses for the same sweetheart deal they gave the YMCA.

The YMCA was established in Butte in 1907. The old YMCA building on Park Street opened in 1917, and the Butte Family YMCA opened the current location a couple of decades ago.

Sadly, the Y had to close the pool for the installment of the new system. That meant the sound of laughter, which was on display in the pool as the ceremony was held in the lobby, went away, too.

“It was a real gut check,” Feist said.

Now, the YMCA is back to full service, and the facility can get back to serving the community like it has for the past 109 years. That means the sounds of happiness have returned.

“It sounds like the Y again,” Higgins said.

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