EASTON, Pa. – Community leaders in Easton are kicking water safety into high gear.<\/p>\n
The River Crossing YMCA hosted an event to highlight its free water safety pilot program in Easton.<\/p>\n
The goal is to prevent more drowning tragedies in the Lehigh Valley.<\/p>\n
“I don’t want to confuse anybody. It’s not swim lessons,” said Crystal Messer, Vice President of Operations for the Lehigh Valley of River Crossing YMCA.<\/p>\n
There are two major skill sets that people have the opportunity to learn if they find themselves in danger in the water.<\/p>\n
Jump, push, turn, grab and swim, float, swim.<\/p>\n
“How do they safely survive that experience and not be afraid of water?” said Messer.<\/p>\n
Messer said it’s part of the youth organization’s “Safety Around Water Program”; eight lessons over the span of a few weeks to help teach kids ages 3 and up lifesaving skills.\u2002\u2002\u2002\u2002<\/p>\n
The program originated in the River Crossing YMCA Allentown branch and has expanded to Easton.<\/p>\n
Community leaders, donors and elected officials gathered to highlight the impact of the program.<\/p>\n
After remarks, Easton Vice Mayor Councilman Frank Pintabone joined the group to take a walk around the YMCA pool deck to observe the ongoing Safety Around Water classes.<\/p>\n
“This is very important to teach young people and people of all ages how to swim and how to protect themselves from water,” said Pintabone.<\/p>\n
The discussions come weeks after two people drowned in the Delaware River in Easton this summer.<\/p>\n
“We talk a lot about the drownings that in Easton unfortunately, but we’ve had many more rescues this year alone,” said Pintabone.<\/p>\n
Lifetime YMCA member and donor Ken Termini said he remembers when the program was just an idea and is excited to see it blossom, with even more membership in years to come.<\/p>\n
“It’s never going to be completely prevented but we can do so much to teach kids the safety around water,” said Termini.<\/p>\n
The YMCA said they are on track to double the number of participants at both its Allentown and Easton locations.<\/p>\n
“The YMCA has always believed that being safe around water is important,” said Messer. “This year we have been able to expand, through more donations, into the Easton area, where we’re going to be impacting over 300 children this summer, in Easton alone.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"EASTON, Pa. – Community leaders in Easton are kicking water safety into high gear. The River Crossing YMCA…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":250643,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[214,153,155,154,6290],"class_list":["post-250642","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bethlehem","tag-_homepage_top_stories","tag-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem-headlines","tag-bethlehem-news","tag-easton-area"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250642","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=250642"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250642\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/250643"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=250642"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=250642"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=250642"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}