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Melinda Craig works in what she calls "the hub of the Y. We have to know all and see all." As senior director of membership at the Westport-Weston Family Y, Craig is not exaggerating.
"We're the interface between our members and the organization," she says of her staff of eight. "We field a lot of calls. If people are happy or unhappy, they call us. If they want to know when a class is or when we're open or closed, they call us."
Craig has learned the answers since moving to Westport from South Carolina more than three years ago. She says the Y is "in her blood." Her grandfather was an officer in the national organization in its early days, and she learned to swim at the Y in her hometown in Ohio. And though she knows the Westport facility inside and out, she says, "I don't use it as much as I should," adding, "There aren't enough hours in the day" for that and her job.
Although Craig says the downtown Westport building "has a lot of character," she is excited about the recently approved plan for construction of a new facility just off the Merritt Parkway at Mahackeno. "Our members are going to think it's absolutely awesome," she says. "They're going to see it and go 'Wow'." The bigger and better facility will allow the Y to grow its membership, which has been somewhat limited by the current tight quarters."
Once the state-of-the-art structure is completed in 2014, Craig and her staff will face another huge task: moving all the equipment from the old building to the new in a single day. "We'll pull it off," she says. "We all have the same dream. It's going to happen."
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