The Chapel Hill-Carrboro YMCA is no longer considering a possible merger with the YMCA of the Triangle.
Jennifer Trapani, chairwoman of the Chapel Hill-Carrboro YMCA board, says the talks toward a more formal relationship are off but the two agencies will continue to work together.
Some community members opposed a possible merger because the Triangle Y’s non-discrimination policy does not include sexual orientation and its membership language does not explicitly treat gay and lesbian families like other families.
In December (see story here), Carrboro Mayor Mark Chilton joined several other elected leaders in publicly opposing a merger. "In fact, accommodating homophobes might really be worse than being a homophobe, " Chilton wrote in a letter to the local Y. "As Dr. King so beautifully put it in the Letter from the Birmingham Jail: '[T]he Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the Ku Klux Klan, but the white moderate.'
Greg Lee, a spokesman for the Chapel Hill-Carrboro YMCA, says local concern over gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people was an issue but that the decision to stop pursuing a formal relationship was not one sided or because of one issue.
“It wasn’t just our decision,” he said.
We were not able to reach the YMCA of the Triangle late this afternoon for comment.
Look for more on this story in tomorrow's N&O and Sunday's Chapel Hill News.
