Patience Pays Off

PHOTOS COURTESY OF GREG PETUSKY

For the past three decades, the city of Salem, Ohio, has hoped for a recreation center and indoor pool to call its own.

"But there never was enough money to fund such a project," says John Tonti, immediate past president of the board of Salem's new community center. Twenty-five years ago, seed money for the center came from a local family who donated $5 million (which grew to $25 million in trust), but over the years, final plans fell through again and again, until a recent state law regarding endowments changed, freeing up the money raised through community contributions to cover the building's construction cost. Tonti's committee raised an additional $1 million to fund ongoing maintenance.

"People will give money to the community, but there's never enough funds to take care of those properties as they age," Tonti says, explaining that now with maintenance money in place, the building could be green-lighted. "For the first time in 30 years we had the funding for this project."

The community center definitely sprung from community support.

"We have a lot of partnerships going on with a lot of other organizations in town," Tonti says. For example, the YWCA sold its former facility and moved into the new community center. Likewise, there is also a partnership with the local hospital.

When it came to design, multipurpose was key. Flexible spaces were built to serve a variety of needs as opposed to creating a greater number of more specialized spaces. With so many different activities going on, control and supervision were also crucial issues. The control desk is centrally located, like a wheel hub, to maximize efficiency and visual control. A second-level control desk overlooks the exercise area and track.

In the first six months of operation, the center hit the 5,500-member mark and keeps on growing. It's safe to say the building is proving even more popular that planners envisioned.

"With the gym, we wondered how we were going to fill programming," Tonti says. "Now it's full almost all the time. Kids come in off the street to play basketball."

Whether it's pickup basketball, a banquet for 800 or a morning yoga class, the community center is already an instant landmark for Salem.

"We're changing people's lifestyles," Tonti says. "They come here to socialize or to work through some wellness issues. It's a big community meeting place."

"Very nice building, arrangement of spaces, use of glass. Scale is right. Nice, clean detailing." —Philip Neeley