Helping Others is the Circle of Energy in Life 

Written by Elijah Schade

Spoken by Alex and Monica Betances

Alex Betances, the founder of Star City Boxing, has known one thing his entire life: you do your best to help someone in need. “We [his family] were the first family to have a Dominican business in Reading. When I was 12 years old, my family moved to Reading and opened Soby and Sons Family Restaurant. We took pride in feeding paying and non-paying customers. Monica and I have carried these principles into the gym. When someone can’t pay, we find a way to allow them to join.” 

Part of what aids the gym is the entrepreneurial spirit that runs through Alex and Monica Betances. Having worked together for decades in their real estate business and regularly managed tenants as landlords, they are more than used to taking care of properties and communicating with people. But it goes back even further for Alex. “You know, I've been working my whole life. I've been working since I was pretty much 10 years old.” It all started with selling food in New York, where he’d spend summers with his aunt. He began by selling meat patties for a dollar, then when night rolled around, he’d pick up bottles and cans and bring them to the recycling plant for a nickel apiece. His responsibilities shifted when his family opened Soby and Sons Family Restaurant. Alex was learning the ropes of running the restaurant with his brothers at the young age of 12. By 15, he knew how to run the whole restaurant front to back, including managing a vendor list and writing checks. But that wasn’t enough to quell Alex’s business passion. When he was older, he asked his mom for a small loan and purchased his first real estate property. “I just kept building, kept learning. This is around the time when I met Monica.”  

For a few years, Monica and Alex’s work lives were separate. But when Monica had their youngest daughter, she didn’t want to stick around her original job anymore, and instead, set up a daycare inside her own house. “And then that's when I started helping Alex with the real estate, because I was home.” During the day, she took care of the kids, and when she had a few moments to spare or the evening rolled around, she began to work with Alex on the real estate business. Her life became busy, and she learned how to effectively manage her time. “It was a very busy time… but for me, it wasn't really challenging.” She later clarifies, “don't take it like it wasn't hard, because it was hard. It was challenging, but I didn't let that discourage me. That made me work even harder. I didn't give up.” To this day, she teaches those life lessons to her kids and anyone willing to listen. She also emphasized the specifics of those challenges. “Working with your partner… you spend all day with your partner… and learning to separate business from personal is very hard.” Both she and Alex echo that same feeling, but both believe that it has been completely worth it, and they continue to work together to this day. 

Alex and Monica have taken their motivation and work ethic to grow their real estate business, but also to Star City Boxing, doing everything in their power to keep youth off the streets and provide a place of respite for them. “You gotta remember, you know, we're in the hood here. A lot more active. A lot more stuff goes down and we got more problems, more broken homes,” Alex said. He emphasized the necessity of their work. “But then once you start, you start to feel good and… the impact that you're having on these kids just by keeping them safe. There’s some kids in here that my goal is just to keep them alive.” 

Alex and Monica weren’t planning on getting involved in a boxing gym at first, but as Monica said, the gym was born out of necessity. A nearby gym in Baer Park had closed down and the youth needed a place to train. “So we had this building at the time. We needed to remodel it, but we thought ‘All right, maybe you could put a gym in here.’” Alex worked hard to involve as many community members, youth, parents, and businesses to donate time and money to remodel the building. The gym began as a collaborative community effort.  

As it turns out, the philosophy of the gym’s individualized approach to helping the youth is baked into the name itself.  Alex explained, “Star City— because at the end of the day, we're all Stars in our own world. We are the main player in our life. And that’s one of the things that I encourage the most— is to focus on yourself.”  

Every day in the gym, youth and adults come in to train, whether it's to work on their personal fitness, decompress, stay focused on self-improvement, or box competitively. As Monica explains, “Half of them probably will box competitively, and then half of those are trying to take it to the next level.” While plenty in the gym would compete in local tournaments with other gyms, there’s an even smaller number of boxers that want to make boxing their profession, and get into national tournaments. That’s the “next level” as Monica called it, and it requires a strict adherence to certain lifestyle changes and principles. “Boxers have to maintain weight and sometimes have to lose ten or fifteen pounds in a short time, which is difficult. So that takes a toll on them. The family. The parents. Trying to find proper foods, proper nutrition.” Alex and Monica typically reach out to the community for nutrition advice for the boxers. 

The role that Star City Boxing plays is more than just preventive, though. The gym takes it beyond keeping youth from the allure of the streets. They focus on building positive mindsets and teach youth to take charge of their lives in responsible ways. “So when these kids come in is they don’t have confidence,” Alex explains. “Sometimes they'll come here to sign up and the mom is there. And the kid is here and the mom is the one talking, and I’ll ask the kid questions and talk to them, trying to get them out of that shell. That progression and that growth, little by little, is beautiful to see. You get to a point where you can’t shut them up after a while.” His words trail off with an upbeat laugh. They echoed Alex’s philosophy in the process. “Confidence is important. No matter what you’re doing. Once you get your confidence up, it keeps growing and growing. You’ll walk different,  look different, and ask questions different.”  

Star City Boxing occasionally works with other gyms to set up sparring matches for their boxers. During one of these events, Alex and the coaches were actively managing the gym and ensuring the event went well, making sure that coaches had water for their boxers in between bouts and running the timer for each round. Sometimes, that meant taking a kid out of the ring that shouldn’t be there after a rough round. Witnessing the various coaches talk to the boxers, of which there were all ages, showed that confidence building that Alex and Monica emphasized. When the sparring took a turn in a boxer’s favor, the coaches reminded them to stay focused and encouraged them to keep making smart moves. When it wasn’t going well, they kept the boxers’ heads in the game, reassured them that they could keep going, and didn’t let them give up for even a second. 

Practicing with coaches and sparring with other gyms’ boxers are only two parts of the gym’s commitment to improving the community. The gym organizes events on top of their boxing, aiming to improve the lives of the people in Reading. Monica said that in the past they’ve tried holding several events semi-annually, though COVID had limited the events to once a year. The gym thrives on service, and even for those that can’t be involved financially, there’s still help to be given. “We have a barbecue, back to school giveaway, and then neighborhood cleanup where we walk around the neighborhood with garbage bags. And all the kids get involved, and the parents. We always have a really great turnout. Even if you don’t have much to give, if you're doing that you're giving back already.” Although money is important to maintaining the gym’s operations, what they really look for is community change, especially in the relationships between the youth and their parents. Monica credits that to the gym’s positive spirit --“...energy, positive energy in here, and the kids feel that, the parents feel it. Everyone feels and that's why… they leave and they come back with someone else. With another friend, with another parent, because it's just a different energy here.”  

Alex talks a lot about the gym’s energy from both ends. It’s not just the energy that he, Monica, and the coaches all put into it— he describes how the gym gives back to him, and how the kids keep him motivated too. “They rejuvenate me a lot of the time… It's not easy to do this every day, every week of the year. So when I walk in here, and I see some of these kids grinding, fighting, going through that sacrifice, that really re-energizes me.” It’s like a circle, he says, and that the impact he has on their lives helps keep him motivated too. Seeing results keeps him coming in, day after day. 

Looking for closing statements, Alex laughed and reminisced for a moment. “There's a lot that I can say and I’d just like to say that I'm extremely proud of all the kids in our gym and the hundreds of kids that have come through our gym.” Continuing, he talks about some prospects for Star City’s future. “My goal with these kids is that if I can get them as they grow up to believe in what we believe in, which is helping others, they can come back later on in life and help the next group of kids succeed in their own lives and with a strong understanding of the importance of giving back to their communities.”