YMCA of Rock River Valley - Camp Winnebago at 1247, 5804 North Main Street, Rockford, Illinois.

I am so disappointed and disgusted by the director at Camp Winnebago. This review is not about the camp as a whole, but in their event space rentals. My friend's mother worked at Camp for 10+ years and helped us get a free rental of one of the buildings for my bridal shower. A week and a half before my shower, Bif (the Director) told us he was canceling our space rental because we were getting the space for free and a paying group wanted to use the space at the same time. We did not have a written contract for the space rental (we were never given one) and it "just didn't make sense for Camp to pass on the paying customer because they really needed the money." We worked with Bif to use a different building although he said "if another paying customer comes, I will have to cancel your event." We finally came to an agreement that he WOULD NOT give our space away, and I requested written confirmation. He sent my mother a contract the week of the event which she signed and sent back along with a few questions he never responded to. Friday evening, we showed up to start setting up (6pm) and he came up to my mom asking for our proof of event insurance and when she said she did not have any, he told her we could not have the event. I am understanding that the contract said "you must carry event insurance..." but in the last minute nature of him canceling our event, my mom sent a signed contract back without reading everything. That is OBVIOUSLY a fault on our end. HOWEVER, Bif never mentioned this to us in our meeting when he said we were all good to go and never responded to my mom or asked her about bringing a proof of insurance until we arrived and then put all of the blame of our event being "handled improperly" on my friends mom, without saying sorry once or trying to work with us (besides saying to call our insurance which was obviously closed at 6pm on a Friday). He was rude and condescending and treated us terribly simply because we were not a paying customer. To make things worse he lied to our face by saying he was not in the position when our event was booked and did not approve it, which was a lie since he has been the director since August, well before we booked the space and he told my friends mom that we did not need the event insurance in the beginning (and when he changed his mind, he told her he would talk to us about it but never did). And the icing on the cake, he let go of my friends mom a week before my shower but told her that we couldn't have our free shower there anymore unless she came, unpaid and no longer an employee, to unlock the building, help setup and then lock up because he didn't want to pay an employee to do it.

I truly think he intentionally took advantage of us because we were not paying customers and he knew my mom would not pay close enough attention to the contract and that we would not show up with proof of insurance. Again, shame on us for signing the contract and putting our faith in someone's word. I WOULD NEVER recommend hosting an event there.