Service and Values

Charlie King, 48, remembers when the Vanderbilt YMCA felt like a massive water world. Born and raised in Turtle Bay, King and his three brothers learned to swim at the same Y that he now oversees as chairman of the board. â??I had a pretty happy childhood, and I associated a lot of those memories with the Y because that"s where we used to hang out, he said. That history is what first drew him to volunteer there, more than 20 years ago. Describing himself as a â??fully New York-educated guy, King went to Xavier High School, graduated from Colgate University and then earned an M.B.A. in finance from NYU"s Stern School of Business. Now a senior vice president at The Capital Group Companies, King and his wife, Cathleen Woods-King, live in Pelham, N.Y., with their three teenage sons, though King thinks they"ll move back to the city eventually. Even from the suburbs, King remains entrenched in the East Side neighborhood where he grew up. When he first began volunteering at the Y, he helped kids in the after-school programs and worked with staff to ensure that outreach fit what the community needed. Now, King said, he still works toward those same goals, sitting on the youth and teen and finance committees. The challenge for the Y as an institution is that â??people think of the Y as â??gym and swim," King said. â??The whole reason that whole exercise facility exists is to strengthen the foundations of the community. King emphasizes that the Y helps not just people who live in the area, but also those who work in Manhattan and need reliable, affordable childcare. â??We have a very well-thought-of day care facility right at the Vanderbilt branch, King said. â??Not all the people participating in that daycare facility can afford it, so it"s subsidized. Teens also have after-school programming there, and seniors benefit from the Y"s pool, where they can take aquatic fitness classes for a fraction of the cost of belonging to a midtown health club. While the lagging economy has taken its toll, King is optimistic about the Y"s future. That has a lot to do with the four core values the non-profit tries to instill: â??If you can get teenagers to focus on respect, responsibility, caring and honesty's oh my gosh! We are set! We"re done, we don"t have to worry about anything, he said. King hopes that his biggest contribution is being a positive role model, volunteering and exemplifying the Y"s code. â??If everyone does just a little bit in those four areas to keep the community moving in that direction, he said, â??then everything takes care of itself.