YMCAJamestown (CSi) The James River Family YMCA becomes James River Family Fitness, effective September 1, 2014.

The organization’s board of directors voted recently to disaffiliate from the National Council of YMCAs.

On Wednesday’s Wayne Byers Show on CSi Cable 2, Frank Conlin said the organization’s group-fitness and program offerings for children, families and seniors, will be unchanged, from offerings at the Y.

The organization will remain family-focused, and financial assistance will continue to be available to those who cannot afford to pay full membership fees.

The YMCA has rented the Larson Center from the University of Jametown since the building was constructed in 1980.

The university has hired a consultant to conduct a study of its athletic facilities that will include the addition of a new arena and potential renovation of the Larson Center as well as additional outdoor practice space for football, soccer, baseball and softball.

Conlin pointed out that with plans being developed over the past few years for a new Two Rivers Activity Center, (TRAC), an affiliation has been planned involving Jamestown Public Schools, Jamestown Parks and Recreation, Jamestown Tennis, and Jamestown Gymnastics, along with the James River Family Fitness Center.

The Fitness Center’s staff would become employees of Jamestown Parks and Recreation.

The planned facility would be located at the 7.5-8-acres of land north of Gussner Elementary School, in Northeast Jamestown, that was previously used for JPS 9th grade football.

TRAC would include an aquatic center with an indoor water park and outdoor water features.

The center would include space for the child care facility currently operated by the James River Family YMCA in the Larson Center, an indoor playground, an indoor turfed surface facility and an indoor fieldhouse that would have multiple-use courts and a running track.

Conlin added that possible funding for the Two Rivers Activity Center, could come in part from a ¾ cent City Sales tax, that is presently being used toward paying off the costs of Jamestown High School, which was approved by voters in the early 2000’s.

Conlin says the high school portion of the City Sales Tax will expire at the end of 2014. At that time, if approved by voters, the ¾ cent City Sales Tax portion would go toward funding the TRAC facility. The two would not over lap.

He said it’s possible that a vote by Jamestown residents could come in a Jamestown Special Election in either January of February of 2015.