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 PHILADELPHIA
(AP) _ A suburban swim club accused of discrimination last summer after
revoking the memberships of mostly black and Hispanic children plans to declare
bankruptcy, a newspaper reported.
Valley
Swim Club president John Duesler sent an e-mail to club ``friends and
families'' Friday saying the board of directors had voted to file for Chapter 7
bankruptcy this week, The Philadelphia
Daily News reported on Saturday.
Duesler
wrote in the e-mail that many would blame the bankruptcy on legal proceedings
and negative media exposure, the newspaper said. But, he said, ``the truth is
that the club has struggled to stay out of the red for at least the last
decade'' and owes more than $100,000 in operational expenses and legal fees,
the newspaper reported.
Duesler
declined to comment to The Associated Press on Saturday.
Members
``are all tired and beaten down and just sickened by how our club has been
improperly portrayed,'' he said, according to the Daily News. ``After speaking to many members, my sense is that
mostly everyone wants to move on.''
The
Creative Steps day camp had arranged for the youngsters to swim at the
Huntingdon Valley club each Monday during the summer. But during the first
visit in June by 56 children _ 46 black and 10 Hispanic _ two children reported
hearing racial comments, and the day camp's payment was later refunded,
according to the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission.
The
commission said in a decision in September that it had found probable cause to
conclude that the campers were asked not to return because of the ``racial
animus'' expressed by one member and ``racially coded comments'' by other
members.
``I
am taken aback right now. It really comes as a surprise,'' Creative Steps
director Alethea Wright told the AP on Saturday when told about the reported
bankruptcy plans. She referred other questions to the day camp's attorneys, who
did not immediately return calls seeking comment.
The
Valley Club has maintained that the number of children exceeded the number of
lifeguards on duty and that only a few of the children knew how to swim. A club
attorney said it had offered to reinstate the campers for the rest of the
summer or guarantee them free memberships next year.
The
state commission, however, said other large groups that came to the swim club
did not elicit a similar reaction, and the club had no black members among 334
paid memberships for the last two years.
___
Information
from: Philadelphia Daily News, http://www.philly.com
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