More on the rejected settlement

There is a well written article in today’s Valley News about the meeting last week. https://www.vnews.com/Zoning-Board-declined-church-settlement-30443624?utm_source=HeadlineAlerts&utm_medium=DailyNewsletter&utm_campaign=HeadlineAlerts

One slight clarification, in a generally very accurate article on a complicated issue: The reporter says “(Acker) doesn’t want the church built at all”. That’s not correct.

What the neighborhood is opposed to is THIS SPECIFIC development of this size and scale, requiring this size lighted parking lot, causing these potential traffic and safety problems, bringing this many people into a quiet residential neighborhood, creating these types of potential environmental and flooding problems, etc. It just doesn’t fit on this parcel of land in this neighborhood the way the church has laid it out.

We have always said, and I continue to believe, that it is possible to design a church that would be very large, and still be appropriate for this specific piece of land without the negative impacts on the character of the neighborhood.

We went into the mediation with lots of creative ideas that we were expecting to discuss with the church leaders to try to find a compromise solution. The church leadership was unwilling to even engage in a discussion with us – the answer we got was that the church would not even consider our ideas. So, here we are . . .