Jack Lund

President & CEO

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In his more than 35-year YMCA career, Jack Lund has held various positions ranging from Program Director to his current position as the President and CEO of the YMCA of Greater New York – the largest YMCA in North America.  Since his arrival to New York in 2004, Jack has made reinforcement of the YMCA’s positioning in the city a major priority.

As New York City's largest private youth-serving organization, the YMCA of Greater New York is still growing under Jack’s leadership. With a career track record that includes several local Y initiatives that blossomed into national Y programs, Jack is adding new programs to tackle the challenges our city's young people face, not the least of which is childhood obesity:

  • The YMCA Strong Kids Card is a major initiative to engage more kids in structured physical activity and play;
  • Teens Take the City is seeing success in engaging more adolescents in shaping the future of their neighborhoods, boroughs and city;
  • 2nd Grade Swim is developing vital skills and a sowing the seeds for a lifetime of fun in the water

In strengthening the YMCA’s position in New York’s neighborhoods, Jack has led the YMCA in an ambitious branch renewal process that seeks to update over 1.3 million square feet of facilities throughout the five boroughs, in order to serve more kids and families than ever before. A number of significant projects are transforming the face of the YMCA as vibrant centers of community life, including opening the doors of the first new YMCA in Brooklyn since 1926, a complete renovation of the historic Bedford-Stuyvesant YMCA and the Chinatown YMCA’s first facility since its inception in the mid-1970s.  Projects currently in the works include new YMCAs underway for the Rockaways and Coney Island, a major reconstruction of the YMCA center in Ridgewood, Queens, slated to reopen in 2010, and a proposed new YMCA facility as part of the Flushing Commons redevelopment project. Five New Americans Welcome Centers serve as a gateway for recent immigrants to find their way in their adopted homeland, with ESOL and job training programs.

In working to make the YMCA of Greater New York the destination for not-for-profit staff, civic leaders and major donors, Jack has implemented several new initiatives. For a professional staff of more than 4,500, staff’s professional growth is cultivated and supported at each stage of their career paths, from NYC University for new employees to the Executive Leadership Institute (ELI) for the next generation of branch leadership. Building on a tradition of volunteer service since 1852, new board orientations and annual Board Summits bring together branch and association volunteers to help craft the future of the organization.

Jack serves on the Board of Directors of New York’s Tanenbaum Center for Interreligious Understanding, an organization committed to defusing verbal and physical violence perpetrated in the name of religion. In 2006 he accepted a two-year Presidential appointment to the federal Community Development Advisory Board, which represents community development organizations, consumer/public interests, insured depository institutions and Native American tribal development in its advisory role to the Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFI) Fund.

Jack serves the YMCA in a national capacity as chair of the YMCA Activate America initiative, the YMCA's bold approach to directly address our nation's growing health crisis, transforming the way YMCAs work, both internally and externally, to support all kids, adults, families and communities in their pursuit of well-being in spirit, mind and body. Additionally, Jack is past chair of the YMCA’s Urban Group, an organization of CEOs of the top 30 YMCAs in North America.

On the global stage, Jack is past chair of the YMCA World Urban Network, a network of YMCA CEOs from the world's largest cities who together are dedicated to strengthening the work of YMCAs in major urban centers around the world. 

Jack received his B.A. in Political Science from Philadelphia’s LaSalle University and his M.Ed. in Community Leadership & Development from Springfield College, where he serves as a Trustee and adjunct professor.

A native of Bethlehem, Pa., Jack is an avid cyclist, golfer and pianist.