Farmville YMCA Adds Its First Pickleball Courts After Years of Member Requests
- The Southside Virginia Family YMCA will unveil its first two pickleball courts at a free community open house on Saturday, Sept. 19.
- A $25,000 Dominion Energy Foundation grant, Vannoy Construction and the Gee family foundation helped fund the project.
- The same event unveils a remodeled multi-purpose room that already hosts a 12-week program for cancer survivors.
A Members-Only Wish List Item Finally Gets Built
Members of the Southside Virginia Family YMCA in Farmville have been asking for pickleball courts for a long time. On Saturday, Sept. 19, they get them.
The YMCA will hold a Fall Open House from 10:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. at its 500 Commerce Road location, giving the Farmville community its first look at two new pickleball courts and a remodeled multipurpose room. A ribbon cutting with the Farmville Area Chamber of Commerce is set for noon, splitting the three-hour event roughly in half between arrival and the formal unveiling.
“These are the first pickleball courts the Southside Virginia Family YMCA has ever had,” said YMCA Operations Director Beth Zeisig. “We have received requests for quite some time from both members and people in the community who have wanted pickleball to be offered at the Y. We are excited to finally be able to provide this opportunity.”
The open house program covers more than a quick look at empty courts. Visitors can try pickleball themselves, take part in children’s activities, grab food and go on guided tours of both new spaces, giving the community a full look at what the grant money and donations actually built.
Two Courts That Double as a Basketball Space
The new pickleball courts use a rolling net system that can be taken down and stored, letting the same surface serve basketball players when pickleball isn’t scheduled. That flexibility counts for a facility working with a fixed footprint: rather than dedicating a permanent slice of the building to a sport that didn’t exist on the property a year ago, the Y built a space that shifts between two uses depending on the hour and who signed up.
“The court surface can also be used for basketball, allowing us to offer both sports in the same space and provide more opportunities for members and the community to be active,” Zeisig said.
Programming starts the day the courts open. Zeisig said the YMCA will run pickleball courses at the open house itself, then settle into a permanent rotation.
“We will offer some pickleball courses beginning at our open house on September 19,” she said. “Following the open house, we will establish a regular schedule for pickleball open play as well as basketball open play.”
Officials plan to track turnout before deciding how far to expand that schedule, a familiar pattern for community pickleball programs: start with open play and a handful of intro sessions, then add leagues and extra hours once real demand shows up on a sign-in sheet.
A Grant, a Construction Company and a Family Foundation
The project came together through community funding rather than a single line in the YMCA’s own budget. A $25,000 grant from the Dominion Energy Foundation covered a meaningful share of construction costs, and Vannoy Construction, a local builder, kept the work inside the community rather than routing it through an outside contractor. Trey and Kristin Gee and their family foundation rounded out the funding.
The Multi-Purpose Room Getting a Second Life
Alongside the courts, the open house shows off the remodeled Farmville Rotary Multi-Purpose Room, powered by Lowe’s. The Farmville Rotary Club paid for the renovation, and Lowe’s donated appliances and other products for the space.
“The remodeled multi-purpose room will be a very versatile space that can be used for a variety of programs and community needs,” Zeisig said.
That versatility already has a use lined up: LIVESTRONG at the YMCA, a 12-week program for cancer survivors, is currently running out of the facility. The room’s list of planned uses extends past that program. YMCA officials expect the space to double as a warming or cooling station for the community when needed, and are exploring a partnership with FACES Food Pantry that could put pantry operations closer to the people who rely on them. Birthday parties and other private bookings round out the plan for how the room gets used week to week.
“The additional space gives us more flexibility to offer programs and activities that we may not have had room for previously,” Zeisig said. “It allows us to expand existing programs, provide space for community partnerships and explore new opportunities based on the needs and interests of our members and community.”
No Joining Fee at the Open House
The Sept. 19 event is free and open to the public, with no YMCA membership required to attend. Anyone who decides to join at the open house will have the standard joining fee waived.
“During our open house on Sept. 19, anyone who would like to join the YMCA will have the opportunity to join with no joining fee,” Zeisig said. “We want to make it as easy as possible for individuals and families to become part of the Y and take advantage of everything we have to offer.”
Kids get their own draw too: a bounce house, plus information on YMCA programs including its relaunched after-school care, a piece of programming officials are looking to grow alongside pickleball and the newly opened multi-purpose room. Memberships can be set up on-site at the event or through the YMCA’s website afterward.
Small Towns Keep Building Small Batches of Courts
Farmville’s new courts add to a run of small-town pickleball builds across the country this fall. Eight free courts opened in Dillon, Colorado on Sept. 4. Six opened in Union, Missouri the following day, Sept. 5, near that city’s downtown park. Community centers, YMCAs and parks departments are working through waitlists that outpace what a single set of courts can handle in a lot of towns.
National numbers help explain why small facilities like Farmville’s keep getting requested. The Sports & Fitness Industry Association’s 2026 participation report put U.S. pickleball players at 24.3 million in 2025, up 22.8 percent from the year before and up 171.8 percent over three years. Core players, defined as those who play more than eight times a year, grew from 1.4 million to 7.5 million over that stretch.
For a YMCA the size of Southside Virginia’s, two courts is a modest build compared with the multi-court complexes going up in bigger markets, but the underlying story reads the same at any scale: a sport with almost no footprint in a community a few years ago now has a waitlist of members asking for court time. The pattern behind each opening looks similar regardless of size: a modest handful of courts, funding stitched together from grants and community donors rather than a single capital budget line, and full use from the first day the paint dries. Members ask, waitlists build, and organizations respond with whatever space and funding they can put together.
Sharon Stiteler, vice president of the YMCA of Central Virginia, said the open house means more than a new court or room.
“This open house is about more than showing off a new court or a remodeled room,” Stiteler said in the organization’s news release. “It’s an opportunity to bring our community together and celebrate what can happen when local organizations, businesses, foundations and neighbors invest in one another.”
For Zeisig, the outcome is simple: a sport people asked for, built with help from across the community, ready for anyone to walk in and try on Sept. 19.
“We are really looking forward to the open house and the opportunity to showcase these improvements,” Zeisig said. “More importantly, we are excited about what these new spaces will allow us to do for our members and the entire community.”
Sources:
- The Farmville Herald: https://farmvilleherald.com/2026/09/ymca-to-unveil-new-pickleball-courts/
- Summit Daily: https://www.summitdaily.com/news/eight-new-pickleball-courts-open-in-dillon/
- The Missourian: https://www.missourian.com/local_news/union-pickleball-courts-open/article_e903d13e-b0f8-4cf6-9cc5-6430fdb11cf1.html
- Sports & Fitness Industry Association, 2026 Pickleball Single Sport Participation Report (sfia.org)
