Greater Joliet Area YMCA Names Next President And CEO

JOLIET, IL — The Greater Joliet Area YMCA’s Board of Directors on Thursday announced the hiring of Katy Leclair as its new president and chief executive officer.

Leclair, who will assume her new role with the Joliet-based non-profit organization on July 12, will replace Jim Watts, who announced his retirement earlier this spring after 40 years with the YMCA and nine years as CEO in Joliet.

Before joining the Greater Joliet Area YMCA in 2013 as the organization’s senior vice president and chief operating officer, Leclair worked for YMCA associations in St. Louis, Naperville, Miami, Kankakee, and Chicago. She also spent two years with 360 Youth Services in Naperville, where she served as CEO, before returning to the Greater Joliet Area YMCA in 2017.

Over the last several years, Leclair has played a key role in the Morris Community YMCA’s efforts to build a new full-facility YMCA in Grundy County, according to the news release announcing her hire. Additionally, Leclair has been instrumental in leading the YMCA through its three-month COVID-19-related closure and ongoing recovery efforts, helping to secure federal relief funding and much-needed charitable support, YMCA officials said.

“We are very excited to announce that Katy Leclair has been named our next president and CEO,” said Nick Macris, chairman of the Greater Joliet Area YMCA’s board of directors. “After having conducted an extensive national search, we continued to be very impressed by Katy’s professionalism, passion, and dedication for our YMCA."

A former two-sport collegiate athlete and native of Oak Forest, Leclair has a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Webster University and a law degree from the Thomas M. Cooley Law School at Western Michigan University. She and her husband Steve, who is a teacher at Plainfield South High School, live in Plainfield with their son, Austin.