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roll guys ready Springfield good evening and welcome to the March 17 2025 meeting of the city of summit Zoning Board of adjustment my name is Scott lit and I am the chairman of the zoning board please rise and join
us in the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge of Ali to the flag United States of America to the rep for it stands one nation God thank you in accordance with New Jersey
statute 10 4-10 adequate notice of the special meeting has been provided to a newspaper record has been posted here in City Hall this meeting is a Judicial proceeding any questions or comments must be limited to the issues that are relevant to what the board May legally
consider in reaching a decision and chorum appropriate to a Judicial hearing must be maintained at all times for the benefit of the interested public this meeting is being being live streamed on the city's YouTube page also broadcast on summit's government Channel
which is Comcast channel 34 and Verizon channel 30 a transcript of this meeting is also being taken using video and audio so we need all speakers to utilize one of the microphones in the room please note that the fire exits are to my right your left and the back of the room where you entered the city has a
listening system to assist the hearing impaired if anyone needs hearing assistance please obtain the system at the dasas and return it thereafter Nicole could you please call the role of members yes Mr Kieran here Mr Malay here
Mr Nelson here Mr Steiner is excused Mr Yuko here Vice chair Zan is not in at the moment but we expect her shortly miss chfo here Mr feskin here Mr Chuli here Mr nering here chairman lyas here
you have a quorum you may proceed thank you Nicole Andy ball is the zoning board's attorney Mr ball advises the board members on matters of law is the key interface with the applicant's attorney Mr ball does not vote on the applications Nicole ctia is a city employee and is acting as the zoning
board's secretary our board secretary works with the applicants on preparing their applications planning our agendas and keeping our meeting minutes the board secretary also does not vote on these applications also present are experts who are hired annually by the board to provide input tonight we have
Marie RAF from Coler Engineering also present is Ed snikes from Burgess Associates and is our board planner these experts are seated at the table to the right of the board The public's left they also do not vote on these applications our board consists of seven regular members and up to four
alternates all members can participate in the hearings tonight but a maximum of seven can vote most applications require a simple majority to be approved before we enter executive session to vote on the application you'll be advised as how many votes are required each case will begin with the applicants
or their attorney giving an overview of the application process to date and the variances that are required we then hear from any additional expert Witnesses the applicant may have to explain the application why the variances are needed the board experts followed by the board
members May then ask questions of the applicant their attorney and their expert Witnesses due to recent cases running excessively long we strongly encourage applicants and their experts to give brief and concise test so we may get to as many cases as
possible in a given evening once the board members and the board professionals have completed their questioning the public will have an opportunity to ask questions this is not the time to tell us what you think about this case that opportunity comes at the end of the hearing please be careful as how you
phrase your questions they should not be proceeded with a statement about the case but should be a direct question to the witness also before you ask your questions please clearly state your name spell your last name and provide your address is important that a court reporter be able to keep a clear and
accurate public record after all Witnesses have been heard members of the audience have their second opportunity to speak and at that time you may express your opinion positive or negative about the application then the public hearing is closed and we enter into executive session this is where the
board members discuss the case and then vote you'll be able to listen to our executive session but you will not normally be able to participate in our discussion I will ask each app and their attorney if present to come up and give a brief synopsis of their anticipated testimony tonight including the number
of witnesses whether or not they can finish their presentation within 30 minutes I think we know that's not going to happen tonight um this evening we're g to begin with 27 Edgar good evening chairman James first on beh have of the applicant 27 Edgar
LLC uh we were here two weeks ago uh gave our second presentation on that application um and uh we're here tonight uh to finalize that or we thought we would uh I had preserved a moment for a closing argument um in the interim of the two weeks uh based on some
discussion that we had with some of the board members at the last meeting some information we received from the planner we went back and we looked at our application uh and we believe that we can make some adjustments to the application uh and perhaps not have to appear before the board perhaps have an ofri right uh plan uh that we could then
put before the building uh Department uh and Save this body the time that will be required to uh to rule uh and to um to deliberate on our application based on those discussions I've had with my professionals uh and with my client we're respectfully requesting that the
matter be adjourned uh to some later date so that we can work with the building department hopefully come up with a plan that is variance free in which case this application could be withdrawn but we would like it to be carried uh to some future meeting in case we do need to come back here if
there's something minor uh or something that we just don't see in our analysis as of today so respectfully Mr chairman uh requesting an adjournment on behalf of my client consenting to an extension of the time for the board to rule on it uh and requesting that no further notice be required
okay uh what is the next available date we have July 21st July I was told it was July that's acceptable yes okay great uh so then I I know you mentioned waving the time but waving the time until July 21st yes that's fine okay and then the board um obviously whether or not you want to
see notice I know it is a big gap in time a potentially significant change in the plans that you're contemplating but up to the board I think re notice fair enough if that's your pleasure it's F so so we will be looking
then for a motion to carry with notice um until July 21st you said so moved carried with notice second call you thank you sorry Mr
Kieran yes Mr Malay yes Mr Nelson yes Mr Steiner Mr Yuko yes Vice chair Zan yes Miss chfo yes Mr feskin I have Mr tanuli yes Mr ning yes chairman
lyas yes right thank Mr chairman wish you an early evening with no controversy thank you so much um before we start uh the case and the reason why everyone's here uh I'm going
to just put out right now that uh we're going to give you approximately three hours to go through your testimony but understand that we're going to try and wrap things up by 10:30 tonight it's probably not going to finish the case so then we can discuss next steps at that
point okay so with that can I have a representative for 695 Springfield Avenue please that would be me Mr chairman uh Roger mayor from The Firm of uh Linda Barry mccor MC estb and Cooper and we represent Beacon Unitarian uh we
have six Witnesses um so you're quite correct we're we're not going to we'll get as far as we can but we're obviously not going to be able to finish tonight okay so as I said this is the application of Beacon Unitarian Universalist
Congregation and Summit it's 695 Springfield Avenue block 1702 lot 47 the property is in the uh City's r-15 Zone I think everyone here is familiar with it it's it's the old Red Cross property uh
on Springfield Avenue it is surrounded on three sides by public lands Parkland and the uh uh Primary Center uh will the former Wilson school behind it for playing fields there are uh the the facility closest to it is actually the lighted uh the city's lightest lighted
paddle board ball courts um Beacon's been in Summit since the early 1900s it started in 1908 and it built the U the sanctuary that you're all familiar with at the corner of walren and Springfield in
1913 um it was for a long time at two different locations there and they had a school when I first moved to Summit 1978 a school type structure upon wit rdge Avenue across from the end of walren that has all the church's offices and uh
religious education they moved to one location where they are now uh with a project in the early 2000s which involved creating a church Hall underneath the existing church and a structure attached to it
that housed the U other church functions such as classrooms offices Etc um but that facility really did not carry it far into the future and there was an application before this board
those of you who are around at the dawn of Co will recall doing that over Zoom uh painfully over Zoom um to build a new Sanctuary on the existing site because the church had a the Dangler Funeral Home they sought to combine the whole property build a new Sanctuary it's had
some 400 seats in it um and during the course of that application this property the Red Cross property became available you all remember there actually was a for sale sign in front of it and the church looked at that and said you know we could build one facility that would
house everything we could get ourselves out of this location where we have literally zero parking we could create some parking we in a location that would be surrounded by public lands um it would just be a much better option for the church so they uh put on
hold and then withdrew the application uh for for Waldren and started developing the plans that are in front of you tonight um the present proposal really addresses everything that the church has been trying to solve for a long long
time it would be one modern sanctuary it will have seating for 300 people the seating is a little flexible and actually the day-to-day setup is actually a fewer than 300 it's 280 something but there will be testimony on
that um that is more than enough for the church to reach its goal of having one service every Sunday rather than two which they have now because the sanctuary is too small so now we have to have two Services the whole church Community cannot come together in one
service and have overlap parking now because people coming to one service are getting there before people are leaving the other service so that will be eliminated and it'll be much better for the church Community to gather as one for one service on Sunday and it'll be
less impactful than uh the present situation which has kind of two traffic Peaks on every Sunday we will just have one um it will enable the church to have some green space which it does not have right now and which you hear about is
actually part of the exercise of the faith that they really do use their green outdoor spaces to some extent in the teaching and and practice of uh Unitarian universalism but you'll hear more about that from um the clergy
person uh it also also will give us 42 on-site parking spaces which for everything but the peak on Sunday for an hour or two is more than enough for for what the church otherwise does I mean there won't be any overflow parking really other than on Sunday morning
which I think is true of most churches uh in Summit uh you know few of them are lucky enough to be able to park all their uh attendees on Sunday on site um and it will also as part of the plan
the church will have to sell its present property both the uh office building and the existing sanctuary because financially can't keep one build the other it's not a large congregation so that property would be sold um but
that can't happen till we know whether obviously we're going to build a new Sanctuary or not so we can't do that until this process plays itself out um as I said I think the site's really quite well suited for what the church is proposing churches are conditional uses
in the residential zones and Summit that means they're supposed to be there means they're permitted uses now there are conditions under the ordinance which are supposed to be met we don't meet some of those and we'll talk about that the main one being that the site is a little bit under 2 Acres it's about
1.66 um but try to find a 2 Acer site in Summit um you know they're they're they're telling us to put uh affordable housing on the medians and and in streets so we think from that standpoint it it does not abut anything that's it's
really going to be impacted uh day in Day Out by this uh by the church and churches are compared to many other public type uses or institutional type uses they're not hugely impactful they're not like a school which has couple traffic jams a day five days a
week children playing outside and and buzzers and noise and bells and so forth they're really pretty lowkey except for Sunday morning when people come to worship so they're not the most impactful type of institutional you might have as opposed to a school or a
hospital or something along those lines um the church is also um and your attorney can tell you about this and your planner too but church is what's called inherently beneficial use under the law in New Jersey so that means that certain uses which are important
publicly and I would tell you that there's a gradation of inherently beneficial uses but churches which involve the exercise of a constitutional right and a pretty darn precious one are as high as it gets on that scale they are deemed to be inherently
beneficial they benefit the entire community and they're clearly all of our hous of worship are part of the fabric of this community so what that means under the law is that they are deemed to satisfy positive Ty criteria for variances so they um especially with the
D variances we we don't have to prove special reasons or we really don't have to talk about site suitability we really don't have to talk about the conditional use variances there's case law to the effect that we satisfy the positive Criterion of those too but the the
criteria under d3s are much lesser they really have to do with can the site take the burden of whatever the variance happens to be so we have to bear that in mind when we're analyzing uh the church's uh presentation here and then
the negative criteria again because we're inherently beneficial for for many of the variances when we're looking at the negative criteria that we don't do any substantial harm to the public good or the Zone plan or the zoning ordinance the board really has to look at a
balancing test which is under one of the famous cases it's called seea sic and has to really balance what the potential harm of grining the variances might be it has to uh decide whether if there is some harm if they need to adop some
reasonable conditions uh to aerate that and then if they can come up with if they do that whether on balance the the conditions will be sub you know there will be no substantial and the word substantial is important harm to the
public good or or Zone planner zoning orance so there really is a a different standard here because of the nature of the use involved this is not a a gas station or a bowling alley thank goodness so there there are um a number
of variances they're listed in the application they're uh summarized again in uh uh your planner's memo burgess's memo there's there's a variance for solar panels which we're proposing over some of the parking areas uh solar
panels are not permitted in the R zone but this is not a residential use and you know whether that's a D1 or a D3 is up to the board I mean I would submit that I think solar panels are inherently beneficial too maybe not as high a gradation of an inherently beneficial
use as a church but they certainly are beneficial these days but however you analyze it that's one of the variances there are variances uh D3 variances from our conditional use standards uh really the main one is a lot size we're a bit
undersized on the lot and a lot of the other variances from those flow from the lot size there are setbacks and buffers and again they're list and we'll go through them in detail in in our presentation uh there's a floor area
ratio variance which very slight uh and then there are C variances uh parking and then other things that again have to do with setbacks and buffers and there's because of the nature of the use there's some variances relating to the sign the sign letters are slightly bigger than
what's permitted and it's a two-sided sign which technically might be two signs uh but again most of these variances have to do with the nature of the use of the size of the lot okay and again there's a GU a c variance for curb cut width but again
this is not a residential driveway we have to provide for people to get in and out and finally um in terms of the standards um we do always have out there there's a the federal statute Rupa it is
the religious land use and uh institutionalized persons act it really U states that uh a municipality or governmental body can't uh really limit or burden someone's exercise of religion
but through enforcement or application of land use regulations or decisions so unless there's some compelling governmental interest at stake or and there's no less restrictive means of doing it I I don't think we'll get to that level but that's always out there
and uh some indication of how the federal government feels about religious uses I so um that being said I have six Witnesses there's uh Reverend Dr Robin Tanner who's one of the clergy people will just tell you about how they operate what they do uh and why they
need this facility Lewis Cherry the architect John Cody from Langan engineering is a site engineer civil engineer Davis uh Dockweiler who's a landscape architect and talk about uh our landscape design Betsy Dolan who did the traffic and parking studies
professional engineer and then Paul Phillips is our planner who will wrap up everything he will be the last witness um obviously we won't get to all those tonight but that's the lineup so great um do you all have any questions for
me this time I do I have one um is there someone who is out of the list I didn't I'm not clear is there someone who's going to testify about um the other events that will be taking place to take well in the in the packet it said that
the proper will be rented out for weddings and other events well the the U Reverend Tanner will tell you everything that's going to go on there it's not rented out for weddings I mean people in the congregation get married in the church so it's not a it's not a wedding
venue they unfortunately have funerals there too but it's a typical Church use it's not a there's no separate Church hall there's no place to have really things like receptions there it's just the sanctuary great so Roger why don't you
call your first witness okay uh it's uh Reverend Tanner and because of her I'm going to ask her to sit next to mey Sure little h [Music] all right and when you're ready if you could
please raise your right hand do you swear from the testimony you're about to give on this matter is the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth I do and please state your name spell your last name Reverend Dr Robin Tanner t a n n e r thank you sorry longer to get organized than
it took you okay so uh uh Reverend Tanner could you just um summarize for the board briefly your educational professional experience I have a bachelor's in psychology and religion from the University of Rochester and then I have
a MERS of divinity from Harvard Divinity School um and a doctorate uh in Ministry which is from the Pacific School of religion and where have you served as a clergy person so I've been at Beacon for8 and a half years prior to that that
I was at the pedmont church which is located in Charlotte North Carolina that was for 6 and a half years and before that I completed a year-long residency and Hospital chaplaincy in Albuquerque New Mexico and since you've come to Beacon what do you what do you do on a
daily basis what you that's the great mystery a lot of people think I just show up on Sundays and uh say a few words for an hour or two um but along with our executive director we form the lead Ministry team and so my specific portfolio area in addition to the
worship Services include our Outreach Ministries our pastoral care supporting in our Communications um I'm a partner with our Board of Trustees and making decisions for the well-being of the congregation and do you participate in
the Interfaith Council yes I'm presently the president of the summit Interfaith Council I'll finish my term at the end of May thank you uh so is it fair to say you know everything that goes on if you can yes all right so I wonder if you could just
tell the board very briefly again just a basic explanation of what unarian universalism is sure um so a lot of people aren't as familiar with our faith um Unitarian universalism comes from two
historic um Progressive Christian denominations unitarians and universalists um both of whom theologically date back um within the first century of the Christian Church in the United States the denominations date back to the 18th and 19th centuries um
in 1961 the unitarians and the Universalist merged to become the unarian Universalist Association of which our congregation is a member um our denominational body rather than being gathered around a Creed is gathered around six principles or six
values rather that are all centered in love those values include Justice Equity pluralism interdependence generosity transformation again centered in love we're A continuing and evolving
Faith um which means that because we're not centered in a Creed rather we're centered in values it's very much about how we live out our faith about being in right relationship and it means we have quite a bit of theological and spiritual diversity within our
communities and could you just describe Beacon as it exists today for theard sure size and what kinds of facilities you have so today we have 454 members and Friends our friends um are just
about a hundred in number of that 454 um friends tend to participate in one program many of them no longer live in New Jersey and only access our online Ministry um but of our
354 members um you know uh the prim primary access point as you've shared already is our Sunday worship Services of which we have 2 9:30 and 11:00 a.m. um across our two Services right now we have about 161 participants and that's
including our children's program which occurs during the worship services and do you see any change in those numbers as has that been affected by or you expect that to change or grow so we did see a significant drop um
since covid and we have really not gone back to the membership that we had pre-co we had uh quite a few members move um but I will say we have been tracking attendance for just about 40 Years of solid records um and tracking
membership for the same period and we have fluctuated between about 400 and 520 members over the course of four decades so it's been pretty steady I would say and do you does the denomination or do you seeing growth in
the near future predicting growth unfortunately we're a small very small denomination which is why many people are not well versed in in who we are within the United States we have about a thousand congregations the average congregational size is about
150 um part of it is you know that we have this emphasis on relationship and onetoone engagement so we're not inclined even organizationally the way we make decisions or the way in which our programs run to have really big large congregations it's kind of not in
the DNA of the way in which we're structured um when you're looking at making decisions by consensus and through particular Democratic processes which is what we have um that does tend to limit the size of your communities So the plan that's before the board was not
developed with the idea that it's going to cause no it's really out of a longing um as you know first and foremost to be together in one service to be able to um
to gather together for a congregational meeting and for other major life events all at once which is something that is impossible for us to do in our present sanctuary and has been impossible for some time and can you talk a little bit
more detail about the drawbacks of the drawbacks of the present Sanctuary I know it's not large enough seing wise but are there other issues yeah absolutely so um while it is a lovely um intimate space that has incredible
Acoustics um the space includes really poor sight lines we only have about 118 seats from which you can see and hear and not all of those are accessible meaning if you come in a wheelchair there are really only about two to four
seats um for Wheelchairs and Walkers that can be accommodated um which has been a sign significant challenge in addition the pulpit is only accessible via stairs um so we have had to decline speakers um who had any kind of Mobility
needs and there's not a simple resolution given the layout and the size of that Sanctuary um I will say I'm much more attuned to that uh since my injury on Saturday than I was before um in addition the entire structure of the
sanctuary is really built around the reality of who we were in 1913 which as I said we are an evolving uh faith that has changed dramatically in how we worship um and it was structured at a
time when the sermon was very long it was the feature of the service and all of your attention was directed toward that focal point we now Worship in the round we now have Services where we have multiple speakers who are featured where
we have music coming from different points in the service we we have earth-based rituals around Solstice and Equinox and we cannot accommodate those within our Sanctuary we often get guidance and materials and opportunities to participate in programs from our
denomination that aren't possible because of the physical structure of the sanctuary in addition it's a very um turn of the 20th century Protestant looking sanctuary and when you have members who are theists and atheists
Buddhists um and Hindu and Jewish to come into a space um that that really reads as a Christian Sanctuary architecturally um is a challenge for many of our Interfaith
families um I know you covered the size of the how many families are members and so forth and the services could you talk a little bit about the other programs and education that you currently run to run at the new site absolutely um so I think we've also provided a pro
that we can be our first A1 I can pass sure yeah I have one I have one um so this excuse me one second so this is
uh let me just show this to you this is a summary you prepared of a typical week at the church based on statistics that were gaed so pass so I know this is always dangerous when you hand something you might not listen to the content of what I say
which is a little different than some of the elements in that sheet um so our mission is uh focused on being inclusive on feeding the human spirit and healing the world so feeding the human Spirit takes us to a lot of spiritual care
programs these include things like Community groups which are gathered around a theme each month the theme this month is trust there's small groups of about 8 to 10 individuals who meet for about 90 minutes focused on the theme in
addition we have a robust Pastoral Care Ministry where at any time there might be a chaplain meeting one-on-one for individual pastoral care if I or the other minister at the congregation is not providing that um
we also have a couple of support groups for example we have a support group for members of our community who are Caregivers for someone with Alzheimer's or dementia um so that's kind of our spiritual care programs in a whole on Sundays uh in addition to the worship
Services we also have our children's programming which is broken up into small groups for age cohorts our children's program right now is UN um unfortunately pretty small it's a trend across um many denominations in the US right now um but we have small groups
you know somewhere around 30 to 40 children broken up into small groups of about 6 to 10 with uh adult facilitators then in the evenings on Sunday right now we have a youth group participation there is about 40 youth um
and about five to eight uh facilitators again facilitating that youth group we also have some Outreach Ministries our Outreach Ministries are focused in several Justice areas including our lgbtqi plus Ministries um our immigrant
and Refugee Ministries a partnership with Chancellor AV Elementary School which is in Irvington um that partnership doesn't really show up much on our site we're going for game nights or tutoring at the school itself um we have a partnership with two
congregations a Unitarian congregation in Baro Transylvania and a congregation Unitarian congregation in jawai India um we are currently the day site of summit warm Hearts which is part of the summit Interfaith Council it's a Ministry to
housing and food insecure individuals although um in April that program will be moving off of our site to another location and so we don't anticipate moving that program um to uh the proposed application before
you um there was a question um before we started about wedding funeral yeah the frequency of those events absolutely so um we do have weddings baby blessings and child dedications as well as
funerals now the baby blessings and the child dedications I would say about 95% of the time those are included in the Sunday service itself there're an element within it um the funerals can range in attendance from anywhere from
60 to about 200 attendees and unfortunately because of the size and limitations of our present Sanctuary we have had several beloved members who passed away and we had to decline having the funeral um at our facility because
it just was impossible to accommodate um the number of people again 118 seats from which you can um actually see and hear and then when you add in knowing that you might have a higher number of individuals coming with a walk ER or
coming in a wheelchair it becomes very difficult in our space to um to have those memorials in terms of weddings we actually don't see very many weddings right now on site our last wedding was in September I would say prior to covid
we were probably averaging somewhere between three to four weddings at most a year and the receptions were always off site more and more couples want to have it at a venue where they can have an outdoor service and then have the
reception at a at a catered location and so we're not seeing as many weddings um in our sanctuary as we once were I don't anticipate that to change with what I'm seeing we still I still officiate quite a few weddings for our members but they've all been off site um and the new
facility does not have a hall right exactly corre that's correct so I I just I think it would be even less desirable than our present location to host a wedding and are there other special events you have during the year that will be
continue to be held we do have um a wonderful Ministry it's a supporting organization of the congregation called afternoon music um they have concerts about three times a year about somewhere between 120 and 150 attendees for those
concerts um and we're hoping that they will move to the new location although the Acoustics may not be um as they are in our present s uary so and when do they occur they're on Sunday um usually in the early afternoon that's why it's
called afternoon music so it's usually between 3 and 4 all right do you want to um take a quick spin through your typical week statistics in terms of uh I mean I think it's pretty much selfeed we've already covered most of it but this will give
everyone um in writing an IDE number some people that are there on various days of the week and you know show that I think that Al than on Sunday morning is going to accomodate all these uses on site yeah so if you look at the typical
weekly schedule one thing I would just you know kind of lift up is you're looking at if if you assume Summit warm Hearts is moving come April really the during the week usage Monday Tuesday Wednesday and Friday is somewhere
between 10 to 16 individuals and it's spread across the day so that's not even at one given point um our choir does rehearse on Thursday evenings um we have 24 members in the choir that might grow a little but we don't anticipate a great
deal given the size of the sanctuary and how many people will be able to actually perform um and then our highest use as we've already noted is on Sunday and right now this schedule is Built for Two Services which um in addition to
Breaking the congregation apart adds significant staff hours and resources from us so you know we're also looking to reduce some of those costs um and some of that wear and tear on Folks by going to one service and what is just
for everybody's information what is warm Hearts so Summit warm Hearts is the program for individuals who are um housing and food secure it runs from 9:00 a.m. to 1 p.m. um and again it's you know moving shortly you're not
planning on hosting that no we are not and is there any space that's uh you're planning on using as a homeless shelter of any kind no AB no no so there's nothing like that proposed for the new no there's not thank
you um so I'd like to turn a little bit to the to the current proposal and if you could just briefly describe the the planning process that the church went through with its professors professionals to arrive at the yeah absolutely um so we began by um first
having congregational meetings about even obtaining the property at the Red Cross and then exploring really what would be some of the opportunities there that simply don't exist where we are or at 309 Springfield our previous application um once we made the decision
to move forward the congregation put together a team which we call the facilities expansion team or F Unitarian Universalist love acronyms so stop me at any point if I start acronym it up um the f is composed of members of the
congregation that have different skill sets so we have some members who are Architects we have you know some members who have experience with sustainability which is a priority for this project for us because of our faith values and so that team gathered together and then
began the process of exploring um who we would have as an architect we were really clear that the architect absolutely had to have experience in building religious space in particular sanctuaries because they have a unique
set of needs and it's not the same as some other um some other projects and we were hoping to find someone but we weren't sure we could who had an experiences a in a Unitarian Universalist space and that's exactly why we picked Lewis Cherry after a
search um across the country he's not only built several sanctuaries um and design you know been able to design really effectively for the needs of worship but he's also specifically worked with Unitarian Universalist um
which creates some different elements in the design um and he understands our values and Faith so the would you say that the design you've arrived at really is a Roger make sure you speak in in the microphone I'm sorry yeah no problem
sorry you have to share thank you um would be fair to say that the design you've arrived at is really a reflection of your core values and your faith in terms of the physical manifestation of it in the building yeah absolutely in several ways so um early on Lewis and
the team we also were really excited that leis um when we were interviewing brought the landscape architect Tavis um to together because for us with that value of interdependence um relationship with the Earth we have many people who are earth
based in their spirituality is really key to us we have Equinox Services Solstice Services The rhythms of nature are important to us much of our curricula from our denomination calls for us to take our children outside and have an experience outside you know um
in the natural environment we're not able to do that at our present location um and so to have Lewis and Tavis come together and their initial design was um which led to what is before you was a nautilus this this sense of spiritual
Evolution also of having um these curves that really interplayed with the natural environment we weren't at odds with the landscape but the landscape architecture was woven in from the beginning we were going to be able to have a design that we think could get us to Net Zero or
very close close to it that's a key value for us and it was a space that evoked a spirituality without having overt symbology that would be exclusive to particular members in our community but really evoked these values of being
in harmony with nature um the roundness of being you know welcomed into a space that's inclusive coming into a sanctuary where the natural light is at play where we can have Worship in the round all of these features were very intentional in
the design to be expressions of our faith and to allow us to better practice our faith now I think you described some of the benefits of of the new proposal particularly the ability to have one Service uh for Sunday and to have some
on onsite parking um did you actually um consider whether the existing building could be saved or reused we did um in honesty the you know this has been as I look back over the records and I've
spoken to our prior ministers the conversation about our space and the struggle with our space actively began in the congregation 40 years ago I mean this has been ongoing and recurrent um and it has really been um a a present and
persistent challenge that has only grown also as our denomination and as our faith we just passed these new six values centered in love as all of these things have happened it has made it our space has been um consistently more
inconsistent with the practice of modern unarian universalism so in the course of your planning did you hold meetings with the neighbors or reach out to neighbors absolutely um so we held four meetings in total um we also went door Todo and
did um just you know knocked on doors introduced ourselves um we shared some flyers both for community events um that we were hosting at the space as well as for the meetings we developed an email list with the neighbors who attended meetings and continued to give updates
to them in December we heard concerns that there was a rumor there were several rumors one that we were um uh creating a homeless shelter another that we were um going to be building a deli and another that we were um I don't
think a unarian Universalist Deli for the record would be a very exciting thing but any rate um and then there was a concern that we were putting um storefronts up at the site so we developed an FAQ in response to the concerns that we were hearing um we held
an additional neighbor meeting and then we went door Todo with the feq talking to folks handing it out seeing if there were additional questions um I also had a meeting with the principal at Wilson Primary Center because we really want to be in good relationship um with the
school as well I mean they're close to our property and um the playground's right there so and we envision you know one of our hopes for this property is that it really unlike our present space which is kind of you know we're landlocked and we're kind of like the
doors are closed most the time it's not a very permeable property if you will we really hope that this will continue to be a community property um it has that quality people my office is over there so people I see people walking their dogs across the property there's one
person who walks her cat um in the road of dendrin near us there we put a labyrinth in there there are families consistently out at the Labyrinth there are other families that cross over our property to pick children up from Wilson Primary Center um so we hope that that
quality of really shared space that the contemplative spaces we are creating the Labyrinth that will be there continue to feel like community space not just something that is reserved for our membership so just to summarize would
you U would be your opinion that this project is directly related to your the Beacon's religious life and necessary to secure its future and to keep it a strong and thriving Community absolutely um you know
I think Co in a way um also made us realize how important it is to be able to be together um and it was really painful coming back when we realized we were back in two services and we were back in the split um Dynamic we have
members regularly who only go like many communities who only go to the 9:30 and we have folks who only go to the 11 and sometimes it can be years and they meet each other and they're you know they'll say to each other oh hello like is this your first time here and the person will respond no I've been coming for a decade
and uh that's not great given how we operate as a faith when relationship and onetoone contact is so important okay thank you I I have no further questions for Reverend Tanner okay thank you uh I'll First Look to our board experts to see if they have any
questions for this witness um not at this time I don't have any okay I have a few questions sure um with regards to the building form and shape that that is proposed under the architecture maybe this is a question more for the architect but I thought you might want to add to this is that how
did you arrive at that ultimate uh form of the building including the ancillary parts of the building realizing that there's a parking deficit that's being asked for and I'm sure you have you'll have testimony regarding that but have you explored other options as far as
available parking um we did and I would say in terms of the other options the engineers might be better prepared in the architect to answer that but um I will say the the other spaces the landscape spaces to us include things
that aren't like an extra add-on there's a memorial space um that we don't have in our present building that we really long for a way to memorialize um members of the congregation so that's one space I mentioned the um contemplative space
in The Labyrinth that's a core practice in many Unitarian Universalist congregations so that was something that we brought up pretty early on in the process and said we really want to have a labyrinth is that is there any way that we can have a labyrinth we need a
space Also to be able to have small intimate um outdoor worship um which is sometimes in uu communities called uh outdoor uh Circle worship uh so and then the organic play areas were important because our children are quite literally
right now climbing the railings on the outside of our building um so you know they seem core to us in terms of the programs of the congregation and its Mission the outdoor uh Gathering spaces or the play area that's primarily during
Services being used um primarily during Services yeah no daycare centers being facility okay um you mentioned that this is to consolid to one service on a Sunday and I think your application
covers that um are you um going into this with the understanding that you're going to submit that to the board that you're looking just for one service on a Sunday yes at this point oh yeah I just want to confirm that yeah we don't know
the exact time that'll be a whole okay because that that goes to the whole discussion about use yeah probably about 10: a.m. a single service is what we're looking at okay um you have some connections to adjacent
properties what was the intent for that um as I said we were really interested in um keeping access points and I think the landscape architect will be really well poed to speak to this spe in specific instances but to create a property where people don't feel like
they're trespassing if they're walking their dog or if they're trying to access the Parkland or if they're trying you know now people regularly Park in our parking lot and then walk over to the courts um or they might park there and
then walk over to Wilson Primary Center um because they have a child there so I think some of creating some of that feel of like Community relationship and openness was very intentional um you'll see that we have two entrances as well
we have a turnaround in the back now to really ease the flow of movement on a Sund day again in consideration of the neighbors okay you had mentioned the funerals and weddings um and some of those events when do the the weddings
you had mentioned occur on the Sunday most likely most likely on a Sunday sometimes they will be on uh Saturday you know like around between 11:00 a.m. and 1: p.m. um funerals are typically Saturdays around the same time every now
and then we get a funeral where they want to have it at 2 p.m. but usually they're somewhere between 11:00 a.m. and 1: p.m. okay I think that's all the questions here thanks it questions from the board for this witness Mr Curr hi thanks um
just some clarity around membership I think you had mentioned 454 members and Friends 354 which were members correct um and then you referenced kind of a 40-year range of 400 to 520 yes so how does that is that
including the friends is that not including the friends um it does include friends yeah got it yeah and then when you speak about members that includes children or or no no we don't count um children in our membership when they turn 16 they're able to join the
congregation okay yeah thank you yeah a couple questions so your the handout you gave us tonight looks like you're saying the average attendance at the early service is 63 and the second service is 98 that's right so the total
is about 160 um yep my memory may be faulty but seems several years ago I I was attendance higher several years ago as I thought we were talking about higher numbers it was higher yes we've not
really a lot of the folks that join us online now haven't come back in person we had quite a few members move um so yeah and let just to clarify you continuing to stream your services
for members absolutely that's one of the appeals of the uh new property our current property we have a lot of issues we're Limited in how we can put cameras up and wire it because of the age of the sanctuary and the materials that are there so one of the things we're hoping
for is actually this will increase both hearing assistance devices and the live stream experience um because we'll have a you know a better Tech up and I know we hear from parking later but just for the record your current site how many
parking spaces are on your property now well we have six spots right now and are they're I'm going to guess they're pretty much reserved for staff and yes yeah so all all currently all par parishioners all people come park on the
street correct okay yeah um I think that's all for now thank you okay um yeah um where in the new building are you going to have a residence there as a pastor no you won't be living on site no
okay um and you said you're the president of the Interfaith Council right now um the members of the Interfaith Council how many can you tell me around how many of those members have congregations or um where they're able
to have all they hold congregation in one service you're saying is that you know you you you don't want to be split between two Services by know other churches within the town that have multiple Services because of space restrictions or just I mean and I know that you say yours is based on love but
you can say that with every um every church so how many others are trying that have one or want to have one service I can't I would have to ask the members of the Interfaith Council and who wants to have one service I mean some of them
have different Services intentionally you know there's been um like some of our members for example have a Spanish speaking service and then an English speaking service so that would seem to me it's serving a different need I can comment on the size of sanctuaries and
say that from our proposal um there are several communities that have much larger sanctuaries than what we are proposing in this application including um St Teresa's for example Central Presbyterian um Calvary
Episcopal um and Fountain Baptist but they do have multiple services I don't think they all do no fountain for example doesn't yeah can I ask a f question is there a Phil philosophical reason in your church that you want to have one service I think you alluded to
it but is that part of the reason why you want one service yeah so we have something called congregational polity which other many of those other um communities that I listed do not have congregational polity So within congregational polity what that means is
congregation is autonomous we don't have a bishop for example um and it's less of a top down from our denomination we actually send delegates from our congregation every year to something called General Assembly where the whole denomination makes decisions together so
being able to gather and build relationship becomes really important because we need to know where our members need to have opportunity to talk about resolutions that are coming up at our general assembly we need to have you know the relationship to be a able to
understand what we're thinking and feeling so that those delegates are able to speak on behalf of the whole congregation um we don't we call our own ministers so our whole congregation has to gather to bring a minister in for example so the polity um is we have a
really different way of making decisions um Christ Church is the only other um and Fountain Baptist are the only other two that I'm aware of in town that also have congregational Poli um as we do thank you I also have one
question um so right now you have about 161 people between two services that includes the children um as a parent of four children I can say that um going to church is not
easy right on a weekend when Sports Rule and music concerts and everything and my question is you know how you know is it possible how are you get do you have a sense of whether you might actually have less
attendance in total when you move to one service because people have conflicts because one week somebody with children goes to the 9:30 because it doesn't conflict with softball the next week they go to 11 you know how do you see that
impacting your um attendance I think it's quite possible um but at the same time we do know that we have funerals that will will need the capacity of this Sanctuary we do know that like our Christmas Eve service we are going to
need um this capacity so reducing it you know much lower we already went from a proposal several years ago that was 400 seats to about 291 with this present proposal and that
was in part out of look it we're smaller now it doesn't we don't see the potential for great growth but also wanting to balance that need when there is a memorial um where we need 200 you know seats available so it is possible
it's a risk don't yeah I just have a couple of questions for you you got to stop jumping motorcycles to stay off the crou at least it was hiking it wasn't like I was like walking so the schedule you gave us tonight A1 um that's your
current location correct so do you anticipate this schedule to be maintained the new location and it looks like it operates from roughly 8:00 in the morning to Some Nights to 9:00 p.m. every night every day of the week I me I might be off by half an hour or
something but do you anticipate that being the same way well I think the thing that will change is when warm Hearts moves we'll be starting later in the morning and um and if you look at the schedule like for example Tuesday says
7:30 to 9:00 p.m. a board meeting of about 12 12 attendees um that's only once a month okay so there's several things here the community group on Mondays that's twice a month so there are several things in here where it's
not going to be that full schedule every single week it's going to be out across the month um so we do see some changes and then I would say the Sunday schedule would be drastically shortened right when you're going to one
service um that pulls everything into a closer time period so I I think that would be a much shorter day than it is presently and and then you had mentioned I think it was the Fe committee yeah the facility expansion team um did
you what was the I don't know mission of that team was it to make something um that I guess you fit it to your use as opposed to the size of the of the property that it's on like did you did you say them hey let's make something
fit on this lot without any variances or did you say let's look at how many people our congregation is our daily use of it anticipated uses like weddings funerals or anticipated growth of because let's let's face you know more people are going to come when there's
more room what was the your exact mission to them um because we just had an applicant that is going to come back because he realized that he can maybe make the thing fit maybe not uh it seems like you're asking for a lot m something
that maybe you could have redesigned to fit without all of us being here maybe I don't know does that make sense um yeah that might be a question better for the design professionals okay well the reason why I asked is is she I guess
you organized the team right or the board did yeah the Board of Trustees okay so we'll wait for the professional yeah so I think it's a good question for the architect thank you thank you anyone else I have a question uh can you foresee in the future everything is
going great that you might have to add two Services no okay I think it would be hard I think the congregation would probably oppose it okay so now we will take questions from
the audience reminder you come up please state your name spell your last name give us your address and this is questions only of this witness please do not make any statements um that'll certainly expedite
this part of the hearing and um please hi Irwin Miller five Knob Hill Drive um you I wondering you had said that warm Hearts is not coming with you to the new property um I'm wondering if there's a way I don't know if this is a board question of you to put in
guarantees that in the future there are no shelters or other types of facilities that will welcome in folks from outside Summit who have potentially have mental health issues next to our kindergarten is there a way to guarantee that can we put that in sort of any writing because
I know that that's not the plan now but once it's built you can make it the plan so is there a way to ensure that there are no uh homeless serving facilities next to Wilson Primary School um so one thing I would say is that
we're going to create our to just to start we're not building a shelter but second um we are really um intending to have Outreach Ministries there that are consistent with our neighbors including Wilson Primary Center which is why I took the
time to meet with the principal and be in conversation and so we're very mindful that this site is different than the one that we are at presently and that there's a school next to us um and two my understanding is even if we
wanted to have the same Outreach Ministry we would have to go through a series of inspections and considerations that's not something that we can just do I mean even with the day program at warm Hearts we had to go through that process so beyond a guarant beyond that I'm not
sure would you be open would a condition work for something like that Mr ball would you be open to a condition on the application hom yeah not run a homeless shelter sure not creating space to do it yeah absolutely okay other question so
if you have permission to have one parts now doesn't that carry over until it doesn't carry no it's a new site okay so it's thank you please on so they very explicitly said a shelter facility right
are we want the question from the the Resident was more or less um homeless Outreach including meals are they willing to expand the definition from a shelter which is domicil people versus sharing it at the facility whether
that's Food Services or other we the the church is not hosting people at its site not planning on doing that so I mean I think the condition could contemplate that as well okay
okay I think the way that that the whole way the community is dealing with people with the endless problem is much different than it was 20 years ago when people were sleeping in church basements on rotation that's that's been gone for a while now and
it's not coming back yeah there's a real discouragement um and trying to transition from a congregant based shelter programs to Rapid rehousing a lot of that started because of the pandemic but then we learned as we went which is why organizations now like
Family Promise for example don't no longer do congregate Baye shelter hi him Leonard Leo nard 81 bakman Road um I noticed and it was also mentioned tonight that you do have
Pathways going up to Wilson Park um we live on beakman road and my question to you is do you anticipate since you have so few parking spaces for almost 20,000 sare foot building that the traffic will come up
Oakley into up beakman and park and Wilson school parking lot and because it would be very easy for them to walk down the path that would be the closest you know people take the least resistance way to get somewhere and that seems to be the
closest yeah um so we don't anticipate that I think that it'll be answered much more robustly by the parking study and our expert I just wanted to know are you aware that we have a very big big problem on bakman road with parking we
have for seven years had temporary no parking signs in front of our house for seven years because the part the issue has not been addressed so um it's a concern yeah I'm sorry for that and one of your experts is traffic right yeah exactly the public
will have ample opportunity to ask questions of every Witness that the applicant presents please sir hi uh name is Carl Cary c a RFI live at One oakle AV here and I'm looking for just a little bit of clarity on Roger's opening
statement which I oh I sorry I don't know your last name Roger that's okay U but I think you may be able to provide so the statement was that if this project gets approved here at $6.95 you would sell your current properties both current properties
correct but there was a uh June 2021 discernment letter to the congregation that stated if you decide against building at 695 Springfield he'll work with the congregation to determine whether to revive plans to
build at 309 next door to your existing building and my question is since you stated that attendance is less than it was pre now prev than less now than it was previously why isn't three 9 still a
viable solution um I think that that was uh if you look at the plan that's before us now 309 still had no outdoor space 309 still had no on-site parking
whatsoever it this is a much better solution for the church and it's uh much less impactful immediately surrounding neighborhood but it was a viable but I I I I you know I don't we're going to get into cqu here that's probably the
longest question I've heard in a lot but appr that's really the answer I mean but 309 was a viable solution when we have options and you still own it yes okay thank you hi uh Jeff Sullivan 12 paic
Avenue uh I so I just had a question about the clarity about the faith itself and how it relates to um worship and uh so it is you're saying there's Interfaith but it is but you mentioned
Christmas and I'm just my question is around uh High holidays and other types of uh events or or services or worship that would uh draw a different um number of people and uh on
other days other than Sunday sure so um right now aside so the community includes folks who are unarian Universalist Christians I'm one of them um it also includes individuals who are Unitarian Universalist Buddhist but that doesn't mean that we celebrate every
holiday as those communities would we do have a tradition of having a Christmas Eve service so that is one that's outside of the Sunday time um and we have done a small uh winter solsa Service as well um and those are those
are really the primary ones thanks thank you Matt Starker 15 Oakley Avenue quick one do you serve alcohol at any of your uh current events uh afternoon music does have alcohol at the reception okay
thank you Hi how are you Nicole delaro one oav um you mentioned sustainability as being part of your core values so why would you choose to basically um have a
total rebuild instead of renovating and expanding which would be more consistent with adaptive reuse which is a preferred method for sustainability so part of it has to do with the and the architect and engineer will be able to speak to this a
little bit more than I can um but a couple elements are the condition of the current property but also their location in in placement in the property and where parking is needed there's a large garage that was forly the Bay for the
ambulances um when the Red Cross held had ambulances there um we're actually not allowed to use that garage because it's in such a poor condition so there really isn't some there are some aspects where um the property is in such a condition uh that it wouldn't make sense
it's also where the position of those buildings are um and then in addition we will be taking elements out of the building um for reuse and we're going to work uh with a company that helps us do that so it's not just like take it down
and everything goes to waste but we're actually trying to save as much of that primary residence that were the offices for the American Red Cross as we possibly can in consideration of um the sustainability but it wasn't an easy decision we came to we tried to look at
configurations that would still give us the parking and um and give us the values of of how uh we want what we want the building and the design to communicate um in addition to the physical condition do you know exactly
what you would be able to keep um well we're looking at things um for example like some of the Interior like mantel and stair you know elements of the staircase but we're also looking at what's the possibility of um taking some
of the stones from the foundation for example what condition they're in and actually giving them to other builds so that's another way of looking at it I mean part of I I moved from Hoboken and I moved out of an urban environment into a Suburban environment and part of the
draw to me about Summit is the different characteristics of the homes and that character kind of upholds the high Real Estate Value within the town itself so have you had any studies or input from
Real Estate experts within the town um to see how the proposed development at 695 is going to affect the value of all the surrounding homes I don't yeah I'm sorry I think it's relevant to my home so I I would
disagree with that statement thank you thank you I'm Brett Bond B and I live at 678 Springfield I just want to ask you um is there a resident at all um at the new
church I think you mentioned that there was a program that we have and I can't remember if it's at the existing location or the new one um to do with maybe Sheltering women or people who are at risk so in the past we had um had a
shelter program well it wasn't really a shelter it was um it was part of Family Promise so we used to um provide so uh housing for two weeks at a time for women for families um which included women but that program Family Promise
that Organization no longer does that congregant based shelter um we are also um a sanctuary congregation which does provide um Supportive Housing
temporarily um short-term stay to someone who is at risk so there will there be plans at the new location to have housing for people that are at risk on either a temporary basis or repeating
basis uh there may be yes okay thank you hi um Hillary Academy 684 Springfield Avenue directly across the street um just wondering if you could talk a little bit more about the Sunday music um concerts or I know that in the
past you've had some things outside with loudspeakers and a lot of music going on is that something that's going to happen regularly is that going to be moved indoors once you have your new yeah that would be moved indoors the outdoor events would be things like our annual Easter egg hunt Okay so there's no music
concerts planned for outdoors on a regular basis or no the after music is all indoors and it would remain that way and the kinds of they're mostly doing classical music and Jazz and we wouldn't want you know that would be indoors okay yeah
hello um hi hi Nick ismer is Mt 38 Oakley Avenue so um I think in the prior submission the historic preservation commission formerly objected to the application they stated that the proposed structure Scale massing tree
loss would drastically alter the character of the neighborhood and then they also explicitly stated that the proposal is inconsistent with the City's master plan and development design guidelines impairing the intent and purpose of the
zoning ordinance um given that has there been any attempt to address any other feedback about the size the scale design of the property should address the AR yeah I think the architect is probably has more expertise
to answer your question do you know if there is any attempt to address that though I think the architect will be able to to speak to it okay hello ingred carbom that's c a r l b o 21 Oakley Avenue um I want to ask
again about traffic and the traffic studies you've done because most there are a number of people from Oakley Avenue here but they have I live have for now with my husband for 30 years they don't remember what it was like when we had soccer
in the field and it was just too crowded and we had to call the police just keep in mind this is for questions only and also keep in mind that traffic engineer will be testifying about the traffic conditions so we can ask questions later that's probably the best time for the
specifics of let me just finish saying we had to call the police a lot and we had now not the time for commentary sorry that's okay thank you hello corar s a r a s a 37 Oakley
Avenue so my question is are you going to and I'm using the word going to rather than avoiding anticipating probably not planning so it's a very specific question are you going to organize events like mik grab
party like movie night where alcohol is served or no and are you going to organize events like that like a mikra party or summer party or winter party no I mean we have one annual
fundraiser A year um which is our auction but other than that no will there be alcohol in that fundraiser um at times there has been alcohol and we follow all the lure and requirements to have a server
and um that is requir in New Jersey are you going to finish those events all of our events pretty much wrap up by 9:00 p.m. I mean many of our congregants are older or families with young children and we so we're not usually out past 9:
good thank you yeah thank you please thank you Court Jesy um 32 bman Road I'm just have two questions one could you provide a little Clarity on the shelter um that was discussed earlier how many people are you currently
housing overnight uh on average and you you weren't really sure about if it would continue in the future but maybe just start with how many you are dealing with today we don't house anyone overnight right now we have the day program that is 9:00 a.m. to 1: p.m. but
that's moving the overnight component of summit warm Hearts is housed at three other local Faith communities and it just ended for the year actually got it but there's a chance you would house that in the future Future No we wouldn't house either the overnight or the day
program for warm hers okay I misunderstood earlier I don't know if anyone else did um yeah the sanctuary location is that what you're referring to Sir so so we have provided at different times a sanctuary space specifically for one individual um who
may be a refugee and need temporary place um until they're a you know until we're able to get them housing it's very short term usually um and it's someone where we're you know working with a community so it's very different than like um a shelter program as you're
describing it thank you for the clarity on that yeah secondly I believe you said you've been in your capacity for eight and a half years yes okay um how long do you know you'll be in that capacity leading the church in the future so in our congregations were called by the
congregation and then we aren't moved like by our denomination ation so it would really be either I did something terrible and then they would call a congregational meeting and dismiss me but that would be misconduct or something of the kind or I would decide
at some point to move on we have had very long tenured Ministries um in part because it's Summit is a wonderful place to be and the congregation is also a wonderful place so our most recent Minister who left left after 18 years
and so that that next Minister would have the ability to decide a lot of these things or change the direction no it's because we have congregational poity the ministers really have to partner with the Board of Trustees and most major decisions of within the
congregation actually are lie with the Board of Trustees not with the minister thank you thank you just one clarification on the sanctuary question in the new plan how many people could seek Sanctuary at any given time one is
that one person or one family one person okay hi John Burke 29 Fair viiew AV um I had a follow-up question on something that someone else asked earlier it was about the potential to have a residence for an at risk someone at risk potentially a woman or I guess it could
fall into a different category so I guess my question is and I believe the response was there may be a facility for that at some point in time in the church so does that mean that it has not been defined whether or not there will be any residents at all and if so how many or
for what purpose so it's not a residence in the sense of like it's not an apartment that someone is coming into and living in for a long time this is a very short term for a single individual um and it would be for
someone for example like you know if someone became unhoused in Summit there are are different resources available to them uh that would be made available Sanctuary is um you know something that Many religious communities reserve the
the religious right to offer and you know is obviously in public debate right now so is it safe to say that it would be a single unit for a single individual it'd be a single room for a single individual for a shortterm period yes so
it doesn't have a kitchen no bathroom no okay thank you have a ask a question for Clarity on that um you said that you would you will not have residents at the new location so this this if this there is an individual there are they staying
overnight in the facility by themselves or is somebody in the congregation there do you let you know let somebody like just stay in the facility with nobody else know someone in the congregation would be with them so somebody else would be living there during the time the person who's at risk is living
there well yeah for like a shift or something but not for the whole time no but they won't be there alone correct on the premises correct hi Christina kogan Cogan I live on 686 Springfield right across the street from the church hi Reverend R um
I know we've talked about this and one of my um concerns with any Sheltering is whether or not you plan on running a background check especially being that there is a primary Center um in my opinion you're responsible for the individuals that are
being housed there so how do you plan on making sure that these people are safe to be around children since it's in close proximity to a school um so in addition to have someone and this is like a rare occurrence if so but if this
was the case in addition to having someone there present um we do work with other partners um so that if we're not able to run a formal background check like we do for example with all of our adult guides for our children
programming then we are um we have other ways of at least checking on the person's reputation where you know who in the community can vouch for them how long have they been known those you expand on that like how do you check for them like how do you check on them if
you're not running if you're not able to run a background check to ensure that these people can be safe to be in literally a stone store away from a child or use that bathroom that's very close to the church so the problem is you can do a limited check on someone but if they don't have a Social Security
number because they're not a US citizen then you can't do a full background check that's what I'm saying okay thank you yeah can I ask a question before the next public person sure are you currently providing Sanctuary Services where you are
now so um we do do reserve the right at our current property to provide Sanctuary for someone but are you doing it now I'm not going to answer the question on whether or not we're providing it at this moment I will say that we're equipped to do it
but for the safety of the community I'm I'm a little I'm a little confused between a shelter and a sanctuary I can tell you Mr Nelson I got the city's approval for the room in which which is used as a sanctuary room at
Fort Walder I'm sure you did and I got uh uh the fire department went through it uh complied with all the codes I went through the zoning officer and it's a traditional function of a church provides I do not disagree I'm just
struggling with the difference between a shelter and a sanctuary is is it terminology I think I think of a shelter as something longer term I mean this is a very shortterm one person one room you know
the the the shelter concept really to my way of thinking has to do with living there at least for a period of time you sleep there you eat there you shower there you you know all those things and that's not what we're talking about so so okay I I'll accept accept that but
then my question is if person a stays Monday and Tuesday and then they're able to find a place through your generosity and other generosity from the community then person B comes in different person starts a different set of time frame temporary short term I mean are we
talking could it be multiple people over a week but each one individual at a different time I mean that's does that make sense am I getting to the point maybe re CH how how often do we do this I is it is it daily basis no not at all
I would say it's less than once a year I mean it's an extraordinary situation when all of resources have been exhausted and we are absolutely able to the best of our abilities to verify that this individual um you know has no uh criminal activity
in their background or anything like that has been any criminal activity in your current location um know not to my knowledge there was an accusation in the warm Hearts program of
a fight between two participants um and the police came and removed them but again that program it's very different when you have a program where people are dropping in and you may or may not know those individuals than a single individual for a discret amount of time who you know deeply and have done to the
best of your ability a background check on them thank you so I just wanted I hear right the sary program is less than once a year so it's not even yeah okay correct do you happen to to know uh how close your current facility is to a primary
Center I don't know not next door though right not next door yeah thank you sir thank you sorry that's all all right uh Drew Crockett uh C
CK 17 Oakley Avenue uh my question is uh fairly simple um do you know the percentage of your congregation that are Summit residents I'm trying to do the math I'm sorry I know the sheer numbers slightly less than 20% I think
it like between 18 and 20 okay thank you good evening Alan Academy KH a DMI 684 Springfield Reverend can you please explain uh if your goal is to engage the community and interact with the community and be
collaborative uh why were such a small number of residents uh invited to interact with you uh and have coffee with you and learn more about it as well as receive a notice of hearing uh meaning a very
small section of Springfield residents uh were invited but none of Oakley none of beakman none of Fairview and um even many residents on Springfield were not aware of uh your intentions and had a chance to speak with you about that so
the parameters of the notice I believe are actually set by the city I 200 ft is the legal standard and we can't compel them to provide notice Beyond 200 ft for the notice but how about but we went far beyond that when we went door too and
put flyers um and knocked on doors so we distributed we went to approximately over the course of time about 25 different residences um you know in the winter months we didn't do as much flyering
I'll be honest um but even in February we were out there going door too um we did go down some of the side streets um especially when we initially moved there we attempted to reach a much broader swwa than 200 um and we have an email
list that it includes residents well beyond that 200 ft as well yeah I mean just the feedback that we received who who were aware of all this was that many of our neighbors questions sir not commentary at this point understood thank you
okay uh rich man qy mcsi 65 beakman Road I know you mentioned that the plan was to have like a free flowing space between Springfield up to Wilson and as you can tell from the line of questioning everyone is concerned about the general well-being
of our children who play in that whether that Park whether or not they're a member of Wilson or not um so what are going to be the considerations and boundaries set with your practitioners uh or congregation rather around using the park uh and being respectful of like
the space of the school itself if there aren't going to be fences and how do you plan on kind of making that work well think one of the important features is that our busiest time when our children are on site is not during the operation of the school right so the only time that our children are on site because
they're in school too would be on the weekends and primarily on Sunday um it it's a very structured program so the time that they're there it's not like we just say go ahead and run loose you know we always have we have what's called a
safe congregation policy so anytime our children are inside the building or Outdoors there's a requirement for how many adults must be with them that those individuals can't be related so that they have background checks so there's a lot of safety put into place in our
essential policies and practices um but we're also building on the property in the landscape architecture and the landscape architect can speak to this more organic play areas to in you know to encourage that we're going to be staying on our property actually for
play and for the very less lessons that I talked about so thanks I just have one more question um so how did the public Outreach programs work will there be you know public advertisement or to people who are just kind of at the park themselves will there be any attempt to
interact to try to you know recruit or have them kind of learn more about your faith no we're not a particularly Evangelical faith I mean actually it's um we tend to be a little because we believe in this kind of of inclusion um
it's not a faith that focuses heavily on conversion efforts so we don't I mean even doing the door too to engage neighbors was it it was kind of like an you know a new thing for many of our members of our congregation because they
didn't want people to think that we were trying in any way to convert someone or um or or feel any pressure to participate I mean people are welcome of course but that's not generally how Unitarian universalists they're they actually find
it offensive um in our tradition no disrespect to other Traditions that are different understood thank you please Justin La 668 Springfield Avenue almost directly across the street um learning a lot tonight unfortunately my
house was not one that was approached or given any information prior to tonight um despite being directly across the street I have two questions um we actually did stop at your house yeah and I put fer not according to my ring doorbell but um let's uh do you have that announ that announces your ring
doorbell I get a video of everyone that approaches my door yeah unfortunately no um so I have two questions one is you said that the sanctuary program um you guys will continue to operate we've debated the semantics around it being a shelter but it's very clearly it's an
overnight stay for an individual that may or yes I'm just this I'm contextualizing my question thank you um would you ever turn away a member of your congregation uh if that person had need um to to utilize your Sanctuary
program would you ever turn someone away the reason why I'm asking is because you've said that it's a short-term stay it sounds like maybe one night given your anticipated growth in in uh in your congregation given the new size um it would logically follow that
you might have more people that are in need that are either members or friends and you could also assume reasonably that that program would there'd be more Demand on that program given the new building um sure I mean but given the parameters that we have for it um that's
one of the reasons it's so rare that it happens at all um I yeah I could definitely imagine situations where we would turn someone away okay um the other one is I've noticed that there are other I know you've said each congregation is somewhat separate there's not a top- down sort of approach
which is which is nice to hear but there are a number of other congregations under U uua um that is that the is that the website the ua.org Universalist Association so there's a number of other congregations online that state that one of their big philosophical beliefs is
that they should allow people without homes to you sleep in their cars on their property we can I've heard some Chuckles but that is definitively a very strongly held belief of a lot of the congregations is that that I found online so is that a belief of yours that you should allow your members who are
struggling to find you know some to sleep to be able to sleep in their car on your property so that's not been a practice we have we don't really um and I don't Envision that would be a practice we would have at the new property either okay thank you uh just a
quick reminder to everyone um board members interested public uh Witnesses please speak clearly into the mic we're having trouble uh I think especially people who are live streaming this uh
hearing some of the testimony or some of the questions so please make sure you speak into a microphone and be loud thank you Chris Tolman seven beakman tus I have no problem being loud uh so um you're going to abandon
the um seven Bears to MN so you're going to abandon the um Summit warmart warm Hearts program I wouldn't say abandon it I mean it's moving to a new location but so also popular in New Jersey is uh code blue on Waring stations or um facilities
are you going to participate in that or is that in the work no we don't have any planned to be a cold blue site there are different sites in the county that have already been worked out with the task force okay perfect yeah um so your um person needs a shelter for the night
they knock on your door they come into contact with you how long does that background that's not how it goes so they can't just like yeah they don't knock on the door your attention known to us there's a period of verifying as I said what the
testimony already gave it's not like all of a sudden someone shows up it's not a drop in and if their background doesn't clear they don't gain entry correct okay that's it thank you please hi Rachel Brennan 7 Fairview
Avenue B re NN an you actually read my mind a little there because I was going to ask sort of how the application process works and what is it via questions especially knowing that there can't be an actual fome background check
next to Wilson what is what is the process I you answered it a little there but maybe is there any more clarity than just it becomes known to you that you through a partner organization yep um so through a community organization often
who has been working with an individual um and then there's a process of asking that organization how long they've known the individual through what way what are the concerns how long will this be what is the plan for them to not make this
long term and then I one last question I think there was a question about if there is currently someone at your facility now and you said you can't answer that I'm imagining for security concerns for the individual there or
there so if there are security concerns for someone in the facility now those similar security concerns could arise again in the new facility when you say security concerns do you mean for the individual's well-being or for the
Neighbors I suppose for every I mean I don't know the reason that it's not you know in the individual's best interest to answer if there's someone there now or not but I imagine there's some risk to security whether it's the individual the community other family members of whoever there's there's no risk to the
community but there's a risk to the individual there if there can be there can be so someone who is potentially in a dangerous situation will be housed even just for a night but next to a primary Center which is preschool
kindergarten age kids and a um Park a public park where people are running around potentially I wouldn't agree with that no okay so how so sorry so the the security concerns that exist now would be different for their well-being I
wouldn't use the word security I mean for their well-being like could they be without a place to be are they a vulnerable individual but not because there's someone coming to get them or something like that yeah okay thank you
thank you Bill Hobbs ho BBS uh 21 beakman terce uh little different question hopefully a quick one you mentioned a number of your members are not as comfortable with Christian symbolism and
I wonder is there any plan to have a steeple on top of the building and would you be willing to agree to a condition that you wouldn't exceed there's not a plan for no I mean the architect can answer that more thoroughly but Shand no
thank you thank you hi Carl Cary C RFI one oakle AV just following up on Mr L's previous question which was about the potential for someone to sleep in a car in the parking lot can you guarantee
that won't happen I mean can I guarantee there'll never be someone on the property in a car sleeping overnight in a car at our encouragement no either at your encouragement or because there's not
enough room for them in the current Sanctuary program either or no no you can't guarantee that wa no I think her answer is no we're not going to permit that yeah gu
not be a permitted use correct okay you can guarantee it won't happen yes thank you can't sleep overnight in your car anywhere please Julie Warren 76 beakman red um so you said it earlier about 20% of your
congregants are living in Summit so my question is is why this location why not go to one or two towns over where you would not be met with this level of resistance so we've been in the commun we value Summit we've been a valuable
contributor to the community um for over 110 years um and we care about this community we care to stay in this community um so that's the answer how does it make you feel when you look around the room and your neighbors are
not welcoming of you and your congregants I'm not sure that's relevant we're not I am I'm here speaking we're not going to answer it's irrelevant yeah thank you thank you have a good evening hi Nicole deloro one Oakley um
just a quick question about the summit warm Hearts again sure you did mention that you are not anticipating it at the new site can I ask why you did not abandon the summit warm Hearts after after the potentially accused knife incident at Fort Waldren why it wasn't
abandoned at that point so we were trying to make a well as you said alleged for one um and uh two um we've been part of the city's task force on homelessness trying
to make good transition plans with all of our partners so you don't suddenly make a quick change cuz you can create another problem in doing that and so it's been an ongoing conversation with many Community organizations and partners here in Summit as well as the
city to make this something that's not reactive that's well thought out and that's done in a way that's consistent with the efforts to rapidly rehouse individuals which has been quite successful how are you planning to have security at the facility when it's not
being used we won't have on-site security when it's not being used cameras or anything we do have cameras presently on our current site and I would Envision we would have cameras but we won't have like a physical security person present
when we're not in operation thank you yeah hi Sue Roberts 48 Oakland Place this is similar to the question that got asked too before me but did you consider other locations outside of summit given
the 18 variances that you're asking for at the current location did you start knowing that you were going to need much bigger space and much more um exceptions so for this project um and
the present proposal we did not consider locations outside of summit okay so the the plan that is being put before everyone now was originally what I would call like the
the um that's word I'm looking for kind of everything it's it's the top it's the ideal so knowing purchasing that property that you were going to need or were looking for something much bigger than the property would
allow I don't I don't know that I yeah exactly okay so then you design something much bigger this is like the ideal like the Home Run I'm not sure what you're at can you restate the question perhaps when you're thinking about
moving your church theer that you're moving into is larger than one you're currently in corre correct and was this vision of this building that would need so many variances and so many approvals
the vision when you purchase that property well it's a process so we purchased the property then we put together the facilities expansion team we then hired an architect and the landscape architect and then began having small group me meetings
throughout the congregation and the design is an iterative process so it it's not like we purchase the property and have the plans right away you know and maybe to clarify I mean there's compromises made all through a design process you start with
a you know if you if you've ever been involved through an organization in a building a facility you start with a wish list you talk to everybody in the in the group you get everybody's wish list and then you start whittling um and that's that's the way it works I mean
it's it's not let's just try to build everything and see what we can get away with it's a it's a long it's a lot of compromises over a long planning process for example we made changes throughout the process right no I I
understand that but even so 18 variances and the size of the structure that's being put there is is a large so I'm asking if you knew in the purchasing of the property if this was going to be how large of a structure you were shooting
for so I think I've answered in terms of the process and what we knew when we purchased it I'm not sure and if it's a question about variances that's probably for our attorney um yeah all right thanks thank you can I just ask a question about that because I'm not sure
I guess was the design driven by and I think somebody might have asked that by a number of people that you were trying to accommodate at the the site I think the architect is going to be able to answer well I mean it's your congregation so you had to have an idea you architect how many people you want
to have so was that the driving factor for you know and then you figure out how you may not know how big the building needs to be to accommodate 300 people but if you tell your architect is that you know how the design came so yeah sure it was a factor as was
sustainability right you know there were several up front conversations and values that we that we lifted up to the architect please H young um 36 Oakley Avenue and um so he stated that
membership in your congregation has declined and now with this new project you're arguably increasing the attractiveness of your church and my question is whether you have done contingency planning um in your current design mind um to take into account that
the new project the new building a big sign of front may actually increase membership over time I think given that our Sunday attendance including children is about 161 and the sanctuary accommodates 291 um we do have that accommodation
there um but I just based on even how hard it's been to rebuild post pandemic um I I really don't expect um people people's lives have changed dramatically so I we don't see a rapid growth in our future unfortunately um we're really
designing this for what our needs are all right thank you yeah thank you please hi Carl Cary CA RFI one oakle AV uh question about the design process followup question to the PRI woman's question um before purchasing the
property did you or anyone on your team conduct a zoning feasibility study to assess whether the proposed Church could comply with the existing zoning variances you know you don't get much time when you're buying a property that's publicly for sale but I can tell
you that we did uh take a look at that in terms of meeting with the zoning officer at the time who was actually very supportive of this as a new site for the church and that's um you know Fair one of the things at least that I
was involved in that I can talk about um but you don't really have a chance to do an exhaustive exhaustive uh zoning review we knew of course that we were a church and that were conditional use so that's quite important but we did meet with the zoning officer just just to see
what the city's uh initial reaction would be from her standpoint thank you and would you agree that proceeding without fully understanding the zoning limitations for the site and potentially without conducting a zoning feasibility study could could be seen as a failure
to properly assess the risks involved in such a large scale project um I don't think that's a fair question but I would say absolutely not okay is it fair to say that you assumed the variances would be granted when you purchased the property no I think any purchaser again
you know I'm answering the question but this is more for me I think but you know you go into a transaction like this knowing that there are certain risks that's and any any buyer does that understood because the Red Cross is not
going to sell you a property with a contingency for 30 years to try to get approvals understood one last question if you didn't assume that the variances would be granted uh then you must have been prepared for the possibility of a
scaled back project is that correct no I mean I think that you go into this with your eyes open so uh you know there are a whole range of possibilities are planning and presenting a project and you deal with them as they arise
okay thank you thank you garasa s a r AA 37 Oakley Avenue so I want to follow up in the variances and more specifically in the lot size it seems to me that it's easy to check the lot size 2
Acres so did anyone in the leadership check that oh we are below the two acres of course and what was the answer given to them the the everyone went in knowing what the lot size was of course we did what was the answer when someone asked
is there a risk here if we go if we buy something which is below there's always a risk even if it were two acres there would be a risk and what did they answer to them well I I I can't tell you what my client told me nor do I remember so you don't remember but obviously
everyone was aware of it sure so how does that fit with we care with the community but we just go ahead and buy something that we know is below the limit I don't just to understand from I understand that question I'm sorry so
the doctor is saying we care for the community and then you buy something which you know that is below the two acres apparently someone said there is a risk but you don't remember if those people what they say or how it was addressed that
concern so then how does that connect with the statement of the doctor saying that we care for suit Community I mean undertaking to obtain a VAR doesn't mean that you don't care about the community why we have a z okay as to how
many people are Sami residents I I heard the percentage but don't the number of people oh it's in the mid 60s I'd have to pull the exact number it's in the mid 60s I'd have to pull the exact number because we have 354 members so it's about so how many attend how how many
Sami residents attend this I think I just answered your question I mean they don't all come every Sunday but I don't guess sorry it's too late the 20% of how many people 60 if 10% is it's well the thing is it's like not everyone in our
congregation attends every single week so how many residents attend on a single week I don't I mean I I actually don't know the answer to that I would have to look at and Sunday to Sunday many of our members attend twice a month um not every single Sunday it's not
common in our tradition to attend every single Sunday so okay yeah another question mhm are you going to attend are you going to rent the space for weddings no we don't I mean we'll have weddings if they come available to will
you rent it we don't have a plan to rent outside of but will you rent it I don't I don't care about your plans I I want to know if you will or you will not there nothing R yeah well I enter I enter your web page and it says oh if you want to
rent our locations click on this document you click on this document and say oh if it's w drone contact if it's the other location contact us because we still are not clear on what our what our Zing permits are well we
don't rent the 695 location we're not no you say that please write us if you're interested in renting it so I don't know if you're renting if you are planning to rent if you are going to rent so I'm just trying to get we have weddings available for and we have done rental
weddings very small as I said at the height was Four Weddings a year and that was because our location right now has a reception space and a sanctuary space our new design does not have a reception
hall that's that's not in our proposed plan so I don't know who would rent maybe there can be would it be reasonable to assume that in a bigger space more people are interested on having weddings because now it's a bigger space so we going accomodate
larger events I don't think so without a reception hall I mean I I think I'm answering your question there is an open space people make weddings in the outside space for their reception you have Gardens nice on yeah she she's
answered the question sir okay thank you John Burke 29 Fairview AV um I think there was a sample schedule circulated amongst the board members that the sample list of activities that may occur on any given week at the church and I
believe the comment was that some of them may go as late or if not later than 9:00 p.m. does that mean that the building itself Andor the parking area will remain lit until at least 900
p.m. that would be the latest yeah would you be willing to scale that back so that the lighting is turned off earlier in the evening well it would be can I inter I mean the engineer will cover the
lighting too but the way the ordinance is written and I think Mr ball correct me if I'm wrong but it it basically for for lighting for a thing like a church you're supposed to turn turn off the lighting whenever the facility is no longer in use so if it's if program ands
at 7 o' we're supposed to to kind of power down if it's 9:00 it's 9:00 yeah I don't remember the language of the ordinance off the top of my head but I imagine we'll get to the specifics of the lighting when the engineer testifies and potential conditions on when it can be turned off when it can be dimmed will
be discussed at that point yeah I mean I think the short answer is that we would comply with whatever the ordinance so sorry that's something that would be determined by an engineer not by the people who are scheduling the events at the church the engineer is going to testify as to what kind of lighting is on site whether it's on a dimmer or
emotion sense or something along those lines and then we'll we'll hear that I'm guessing um and you know if the board feels that the proposal it needs conditions to limit it further that that's something that would be discussed in conjunction with that testimony so
the functionality of the lights I understand dimming them in the could be on a timer or whatnot but who actually determines either the lights need to go off at 7:00 p.m. 8:00 p.m. 9:00 p.m. 10: p.m. how is that determined by the engineer no by ordinance and by what's
going on at the church so if there's an earlier so what does the ordinance say the ordinance says you shut them off when you're when your facility is no longer so if the church decides to have an event that goes till 2:00 in the morning then the lights stay on till 2 no and I think there's an outside time so what is it is what I'm asking have to
look at we we can have the their engineer testify as to the specifics of the ordinance to better educate the public on what the requirements are okay thank you sure hi Jeff suin 12 Pake Avenue uh so
my a couple of questions maybe but they're all around um the size of the worship space and attendance MH and so your current space now is how many seats well so there's 118 seats that you can
see here um not all of them are handicap accessible um but you could fit around 180 to 200 people in our Sanctuary but you wouldn't be able to see the service because a pillar would be in your face and you might not be able to hear the
service uh depending upon where you are and how the sound the Amplified Sound Works um so I don't know if that answers your question but yes and then the proposed space has how many seats
291 okay and and that's in one configuration when we use other configurations that's the max right okay so there are other configurations that are significantly smaller and you're saying that maybe with the combined service if everyone comes every week it
would be 160 161 every week and then what would be the expected attendance on a high holiday or a like like a Christmas Eve or whatever service okay so the Christmas Eve service would probably be about
220 for for the single service and occasionally like I said we get a memorial where we might have 200 attendees you know that's obviously once twice a year on a Saturday afternoon and the proposed
space is 291 right so it would accommodate both of those situations correct so above above what you would what the maximum potential would be in terms of needed space well yes unless you think about having Worship in the round and then once which is what we do
for those Equinox and Solstice Services is usually we want to have Worship in the round we also do it at our annual bread communion service and when you have Worship in the round you have to make more aisles for accessibility so you lose seats and do you have do you
know how many seats you would estimate for that type of worship setup we've looked at different configurations where we would lose M up to four rows on the main level we probably wouldn't be using the balcony so it's a yeah it's a you know it still accommodates us at 160 but
in the round correct right y okay all right thank you yeah thank you one quick question on Capac does that include standing or just seated to 9191 is seated that's correct is there a capacity for standing I don't think we
really calculated what that is can ask the architect I think you can always you can always stand but I do we typically have standies no our worship services are an hour to an hour and 15 long no one is going to you never have you never you never reach the point where it's
capacity and people stand around like they're doing tonight no actually there'll be maximum capacity for fire Cod right exactly there'll be there'll be a capacity for seating and there'll be a capacity for standing which you could combine and then maybe do more I don't Mr chairman yes sir I did
find the lighting section if if the board's interested I can answer that question this time yes please thanks what I'm seeing in the ordinance is that it calls for uh all outdoor lighting during non-operating hours of a business Sports facility or recreation facility
um shall turn it off until sorry remain on for one hour after the business or facility closes okay thank you Ed sir please Chris Gerard uh 27 Oakley Avenue
um I actually have a question or two related to what the prior gentleman was talking about as far as capacity I mean we've heard a lot of numbers uh this evening um a lot of numbers cons considerably smaller than the actual
amount of the proposed capacity 290 or so um what what have you said I think I'm asking you to repeat yourself so I apologize you you've uh said on average now in your current location how what what is the uh over
the two Services what is the uh uh normal Sunday 16161 substantially less than the 290 um and now you've you've indicated other sort of special instances correct um where maybe I still haven't heard A
number close to uh 290 300 um more like 250 260 that sort of thing yeah but I would say it's not comfortable to be at capacity I mean that's not something we're aiming for I'm a especially postco I mean I'm a regular attendee of a much
larger facility St Teresa's and it is at capacity sometimes and I I don't disagree with that but I certainly live with it it doesn't happen normally um I mean it seems to me what this board is asked to do is really conduct a sort of balancing uh uh act right question
yes yes yes um so uh I guess what what I'm asking is I if what what would it do to the overall design if the capacity uh for attendance in Services was something
less than what it is now what if it was 200 or 250 you other words if that's what was approved I mean how how easy would it be to conform what you're currently proposing uh to something just smaller because it does seem to me that the overall uh the the the biggest
single feature of the proposal is how large the actual structure is in a zoning area that is primarily single family residential it's a large facility uh it would that be something that could
be uh uh uh I mean it does seem to me that it would be something that could uh accommodate 90 95% of what your uh activities are a much smaller uh uh facility it wouldn't accommodate like
some of the more some of the lurgical Arts that we want to do and worship in the round yeah and I and I guess one further uh question I just I am struck and I know this has been covered that you're in Summit you have a long history uh in
Summit which is which is great um but you have also mentioned a couple of times this evening uh the the the desirability for your uh uh faith of uh uh environmental uh uh uh activities
outside um uh you know sort of natural and you know we are a we're we're not a rural community we're a a suburban community we're called we are actually the city I'm just it uh I mean
I I guess I'm asking a question that has already been asked but it seems to me surprising that that would have been uh that that this facil this uh property covers those
needs um so what's the question I'm sorry uh uh that that the current location would would uh uh appropriately cover your desire to be sort of in a natural setting be able to get out into the the the country and well I think our
members all live in this area of New Jersey which is not Rural and so to move to a completely um pastoral setting would require them to also move their home I mean it just I don't think that seems
reasonable uh move their uh I mean you can go five or 10 minutes west of summit and be considerably more rural than Summit itself I'm sorry I don't I I think it adequately meets with the landscaping and the amount of contemplated faces our
desire to have this spaces um to worship and to have prayer and meditation in a natural environment without going to a completely rural community okay thank you thank
you please hi uh Chris nean 32 Fairview Avenue NE a l n um a little bit about the faith community in Summit and um we tend to have a lot of different churches
and um they're all tend to be towards the downtown of town or at least the predominance of them um I'm interested in the decision you guys made to pursue a property that is in a part of town that does not have any churches and removing yourself a little bit further away from the rest of the faith
community within Summit and how that may played into your decision um well we're actually moving closer I was just speaking to the pastor at St John's one of the pastors the other day because we're going to be much
closer to St John's which will be nice um and there are other Faith communities in Summit that aren't right in the downtown um you know the downtown is there are not many properties that are available there that's a challenge um I
think we've I'm sure that this board is far more familiar with I am than the challenges of development in the downtown area um have you considered at any point using any of the public lands in the more close to where your facility is now for the outdoor space and the
natural encounters you're looking to have rather than trying to fit that in with this large building on this too small plot um yeah I don't think we have a right to include the public property it's not our
in our plan um I guess asked another way don't we all have the right to use the public space in any way we see fit during the day let me I don't think that's fair question I mean it's they can't just go off to the Village Green and start holding Services I mean it's just not
it's not what it's meant for it's not what's permitted there and the idea is to have everything on your site not to pack up everybody on a bus and go somewhere else but public lands are not available to the church okay thank you uh Richman QC am man Cosi 65 beakman
Road uh I know you mentioned that you spoke to or met with at least once the principal of Wilson has there been any meetings with the Department of Ed more generally or anybody else at Wilson around how the two buildings especially with the size of what you are planning
to do going to coexist things like fire drills evacuations things like that that happen at Wilson um I know they will go that way um have there been any conversations or anything like that besides the one or two conversations you've had with the principal um we did
say we would um explore further conversations about those very things I sent a follow-up message I think it's been a busy school year so we haven't yet had those conversations but that would be something I think we'd be open to well I think it would be necessary as a part of the considering the structure
that you're planning on building that's so close to the school I would think that would be something you would want to do and make sure that that gets on the calendar yeah when we can absolutely I agree hello goras araza s AA 37 o Avenue any question regarding this
person we has this danger of security does this security concern involve self harming um no and I actually disagreed with the i with the use of the word Security in the previous question well
I'm just repeating what you said security if you can what which word should I use um I will answer your question which is no self harm is not a concern okay thanks thank
you hi Kim Leonard 81 bman Road um I keep hearing the attorney I'm sorry you keep saying you have conditional use of the property it's is it that that your understanding that you automatically have conditional use or is it your understanding that you have to meet the
12 requirements no under the sum ordinance believe me I know what a conditional use is the the point of a conditional use is that the the ordinance has decided that churches belong in this Zone with 12 requirements I can have it right here would you like
to look at it um you know have the ordinance right here more than familiar with the ordinance that's not a question okay so you have to meet the you that I don't want to get in an argument but when you are conditional
use the the ordinance on the law has reached the conclusion that churches belong in residential neighborhoods and that's what I said in my opening and that's all we're not we're not saying that churches do not belong in our community we're saying that to be a
conditional use you need to meet 12 requirements thank you that's not Kevin mcgoy 113 Woodland Avenue uh Robin somebody asked this question but I think the lawyer answered it when you bought this property did you understand the
zoning our attorney did yeah okay so you understood that for to even have a place of worship it needed to be two acres our attorney understood that yes well I was asking Robin Board of Trustees did you understand
that I don't recall the I was on sabatical at the time of the purchase so at the purchase I I don't recall as the honest answer right and when we look at like the plans and all the variances you're asking for you're really asking for rezoning of this property
essentially are you aware of that I am okay you are um and a lot of the things that you you're talking about that you need or that you want you if you really need them do you
maybe see that this perhaps isn't the right property for you I do not even though you're not allowed to do what you want to do on it you think it's the right piece of property for your purposes I do think it is the right
property okay so do you not believe in z in and regulations sir I'm Sor they have the right to bring an application to the board and that's what they're doing so her beliefs about zoning regulations are relevant okay all right so but you understood everything when you or you
didn't understand the zoning when you bought it you said that's she was bad okay than thank you please John Burke 29 fairb I have I have a follow-up question given the clarification that was made about the um
lighting so what time does the facility close 900 p.m. at the latest but I mean most nights it's much earlier than that so the closing time is 900 p.m. correct is that correct yeah so that means that the lights will be on in
the facility and the parking lot until at least 10:00 p.m. every day no no no so but they don't go off hour after the facility closes I understand what you're saying but it's not like a a business where you have here are open hours that's not how Faith
communities in general operate if you don't have a program going on as indicated in the schedule that I submitted we wouldn't on a night where there's no evening programming have the lights on so you're saying that on an evening
where you you will make ad hoc arrangement ments on any given day to turn off the lights as soon as the programs end no I'm saying that the programs are preset and so for examp but I imagine they're not preset years in advance that's going
to vary week to week or month to month I would assume no but we know well in a month in advance at the very least what the schedule is so you'll make arrangements with the town engineer to adjust the lighting schedule on a month-by-month basis the town engineer doesn't govern the lighting well I don't
know we were talking about the town engineer before so I'm trying to understand they would have they control the lights on the property they do yes correct so I'm asking on any given day the lights May
remain on until 10 p.m. but under no circumstances any later than that is that correct yes thank you hi Drew Crockett again C CK 17 Oakley Avenue um is I just have a
general question I don't know the process for this but is anybody from the Board of Education here tonight the board by the way just so you know was noted was one of the parties that received is is it possible chairman I I don't know the process to request
for the public to have their point of view um put forward here at some point over the course of this process there there's no way we can mandate that okay thank you thank you n mcer c a y 29 Oakley Avenue I wanted to ask you because you mentioned
the Pastoral setting and we live you know we've got Wilson Park what about the trees that are going to be cut down for your parking um so I I think the landscape architect can probably speak in more detail about why some of those trees
need to go it was submitted in our application I'm not an expert um we will lose some trees um uh some of those trees are actually toward the end of their life cycle in fact when we came on to the property as you might know um we
had to do some work because of falling Limbs and some other situations with some of those trees but we're replanting um and and the planting that we're doing um certainly meets the requirements that we have but we're actually adding in
terms of the planting we're prioritizing native plants I mean we're making decisions to actually improve that site because of our values and I remember when I I was there for that meeting when you had at the facility yeah I remember and and you had mentioned you know you
had the solar panels yes and that was somebody had one of the neighbors had con was concerned about the height of the of the solar panels and seeing it from the the people who live on Springfield Avenue yeah absolutely that's a great and that's your question yes okay so um we did take that back
both to the architect and the engineer and asked is there any way that these solar panels are going to create a glare they looked at the height of the property and when they testify I would certainly they could give it more detail why that isn't possible given the height
of things and where they're positioned and and going back to the trees um because that's so important where we live absolutely um what about you know the trees in front on you know on on Springfield Avenue I think that's probably best for the landscape
architect to speak to Okay where we're replanting what kind of trees what the plan is there okay thank you yeah hi Nicole Doro d l r o one Oakley um just a quick clarification regarding the turning off of the lights if someone
was to be staying overnight in the sanctuary in those rare instances does that mean that the lights stay on 24/7 no it does not okay do you know when they would turn off would it be the same same ordinance process thank you thank
you hi Carl Cary c a RFI one Oakley AV uh in your response to Mrs Ker's prior question you mentioned that the planting meets the requirements are you aware of the zoning requirement of one shade tree for every 10 parking spaces
I believe it's mentioned we um in order to to maximize the parking as best we can on site there is um there is no there are no plantings in the parking area itself but the rest of the part of the landscape PL is quite extensive it was
reviewed by John Linson who went through all the trees that are going to be taken down and advised on that and approved of the plan so we will cover the landscape plan in detail but there's there's no room to put trees in the middle of that parking lot it's as constrained as it
possibly can be got it so just to confirm it doesn't the planting doesn't actually meet the current zoning requirements correct not with respect to the parking lot okay thank you thank you I I have one question let see there's another member sorry um I just
wanted to there was go back to the seating for a moment just because something that you had said about um your current space you know there's a lot of obstructions right whether that's pillars or um and now you're going to have a lot more open viewing do you um believe that
your property will be sought since you have a lot of time during the week where it's not occupied where people might come to rent it for say lecture space or um things like that is that part of the plan at all or I later that will go towards you know you have a traffic
study and so I'm just trying to figure out whether that's something that needs to be considered if we're renting the property for lecture space lectures yeah I mean if you can see 300 people you can I'm just wondering whether there's any plan to rent it besides weddings
occasionally not rentals but I could imagine we might have an educational event in the sanctuary in addition to worship you know like for our members okay that's possible or like an annual meeting yeah thank you uh Bill Hobbs again uh h o bism boy
bism boy s excuse me uh 21 beakman haris um your Council mentioned the Foresters report and I guess my question is since the Forester recommended you don't cut down the three specimen trees in the northwest corner where you're planning
to put your trash facility next to the playground in the primary school would you reconsider saving those three trees should deal with your CR I don't think there's a trash facility in the back of the building the northwest corner of the property according to the staff's comments excuse me you're not
the staff the trash pickup's actually going to be at the street it'll be moved down there we don't have a dump I'll ask the I guess the Landscape Architects and engine okay thank you thank you that would be better thank you Justin L 668 Springfield
Avenue trying to reconcile on my mind how you either yourself your members or your congregation identify with Summit would you say that you or your members of your congregation um feel um some tie to The Summit
Community in some way uh the history of the town and maybe just curious if you can answer you know in what ways yeah both the history of the town as well as you know personal ties to the community I mean we have members who live in Summit and have been members of our
community for 50 years and more so is it important to reflect um and well at a minimum acknowledge um and ideally reflect the sort of history of summit the character of summit that is quite unique to the area and the
town I think all things are a balance so why have you guys chosen to so flagrantly disregard the design guidelines of the of the town and um the character of the building the style just does not fit in Summit a lot would AR many would argue and I know that's a
statement out of question apologies but I'm trying to reconcile your identity as being a member of the Summit Community and having a tie to the history his of summit but building a structure that is so flagrantly at odds with that so I think history evolves over time as do as
does architecture okay so the answer is that you don't thank you uh that's not my answer alen Academy 684 Springfield KH ha a DM at one of the neighborhood Gatherings you had indicated to a small group that there would be parking
attendants to help to address any spill over parking mhm um if you're at a point where you're uh reaching capacity of your Auditorium with 291 individuals which I imagine would uh come to 100 plus cars and you only have 45 parking
spaces where will these parking attendants be directing parking to so I think that the parking um expert can speak to exactly what that plan is probably with more expertise than I can in terms of the ratios and the direction but I can and reaffirm as I did at that
meeting that we would have parking attendance we want to be good neighbors you know we're going to have folks that's also why we added that's also why we added the turnaround toward the back of the property um in the parking lot to ensure that there's not a backup on the road
for example just as people are turning into spots understood but the question was regarding only 45 parking spaces on the lot which would amount to more than double that if your Auditorium started to get to the point
of capacity sure I understand and I do think that that's a question for the parking expert rather than me when you're talking about traffic and and where people will Park thank you yeah just a question um you've obviously
heard some concern around overnight any kind of overnight stay sure and we've talked about shelter it's not a shelter Sanctuary like I just want to make sure we're at like everyone is asking the right questions or not missing a
question like so how do you think about or I guess sounds like there's accommodation for one person on the property maybe two because someone else is staying overnight with that person is that right yeah okay it's a question it would
be a member yeah so that it there'd be accommodation for two people Max in the plans to be able to stay overnight correct okay thank you but that member wouldn't necessarily be sleeping though that's the point that I'm trying to exactly
yep ragav ranganathan um I can spell the last name it's r n g n a t h n at 690 Springfield Avenue right across the way uh thank I did receive your flyers and I did attend a couple of your events um
how long has the longest resident stayed at your current uh location in downtown seeking Sanu I think around a 2 week okay um how did you assess that
291 seats is the right number of seats um so we looked at you know these extraordinary events but we also the 291 is seated it's a seating arrangement facing the pulpit kind of in straight
rows so um as I said before we also wanted a flexible space that's why we don't have pews we have chairs so that if we were able to do worship in the round which significantly it it takes a lot of the seats away so that was a factor so why not 400
seats um so the question I don't I don't think we envision needing 400 yeah so rather than rather than lead you to more questions okay um you have a regular capacity requirement of about 160 seats for your Sunday service this between the
two so a total of 160 seats so even if you used a facility that would allow 200 seats mhm you would still be able to operate the facility for the primary use of a single service on Sundays so why seek all of these
variances so um as I stated before there are other events like our Christmas Eve service which exceed that 100 you know 160 so that's one Worship in the round diminishes the number of seats cuz now
you go from a center aisle into two side aisles to at least four aisles which just cuts down the amount of space and then also we do occasionally have memorials and it has been heartbreaking
to have to say to a 50 60 year member's family that we can't have your Memorial here um and that was the upper limit for those memorials okay uh you are able to accommodate the Christmas service today
at your current facility how many people attend that now at maximum um well it's smaller since the pandemic but about across the multiple Services we have when you combine them um I'd have to look back but I think
it's somewhere around 2:30 220 yeah right so uh the opinion and not the question is you could serve the community question question you could serve the sir questions only thank you before the next person asks questions
this Worship in the round yeah um like you turn people away then if you don't have enough seats if you reduce the capacity be able to come in yeah I mean there's nowhere to if there's nowhere to sit there's nowhere to sit right well would they stand for
that no I don't think so I mean oh sorry what's Your Capacity again when it's worshiping the round configuration it's smaller it's probably around I'd have to look back at the exact configurations we did but we lose somewhere between two to four
rows um could you have that number for the next meeting sure thank you and how many times a year do you have Worship in the round um usually on the bread communion as I mentioned the equinox and one of the solstice services so three three to five yeah because there's a
fall equinox in a spring Your Capacity is based on the square footage and so many people per square foot and all that kind of stuff so even though you may have less seating correct capacity is capacity yeah I understand please hi Rachel Brennan 7 Fairview
Avenue B R NN an I wanted to follow up on a comment earlier because I will admit I am confused on some of the terminology between various different overnight days or even if not overnight St you know other events going going on
um during the day um so thank you for the clarification I guess my two really hopefully quick questions are one um there was a comment that you know if someone is staying there there's a member who is staying with that person I'm just wondering does that
member um have to undergo any sort of training or do any sort of preparation or what is the process for that person and is it a new person every night um just some background on who that member is yeah so it's a long-term member who's trained in being a welcoming presence
and also understanding you know the facility and what is trained I'm not what is trained in being a welcoming presence mean like you know being able to say uh would you like a glass of water how do you have a blanket how can
I help but no training in dealing with someone who is at at whatever the terminology that we're using is no training in that specific space I I don't know how to answer the question I mean we're when you're offering Sanctuary you're hosting
someone if we wouldn't host someone who like needed medical intervention if that's what you're asking because that would be beyond our capacity okay so yeah so it's just someone who's there overnight kind of to just be another presence in the building sure that's
correct okay thank you um and then I know we focused a lot about at night um but are there any sort of similar programs during the day that maybe just haven't been on our radar because we've been focusing on the nighttime overnight issue no I mean as I said Summit warm
Hearts the day program is moving to a new location we have a meditation group during the day I've listed all of the other daytime program so a community group which is just our small groups of members 8 to 10 who are meeting um yeah
that's that's it okay thank you sure thank you please Obby Friedman 34 Harley Road um Reverend Tanner I know that you are the mother of young children and I was just wondering if you have ever felt like your children
were in danger as a result of the programming at uh Beacon church thank you um Rabbi for the question uh no not at all in fact uh my children participate in all of our lifespan programs um since coming to the
congregation you know our youngest was born and really raised in the midst of the congregation and I absolutely would not put any of my five children in a dangerous situation which is why we have the safe congregation policy and the
protocols that we do have and in fact the safety policies of this congregation drew me to bring my family and come to this congregation because they so value the safety of our children and youth and I assume you use the same standard with the other children in your congregation
absolutely thank you thank you hello uh Nick ismert ismt from 38 Oakley Avenue um so the the parking uh it sounds like there's some events um where attendance can be above the
typical weekly attendance and in that case um parking could potentially swell beyond the I think there were a 100 of an estimate is that true um I think on the parking apologies this might be frustrating but I'm still going to refer
to miss Dolan and the parking study that was done um and then for the the I believe from past reports the city staff has uh voiced concerns about the parking deficiencies and the city has a complete streets resolution to make our streets
safe not only for cars but also for pedestrians as well as cyclists um and if the plan for overload over flow parking is to have everybody Park along the shoulder of Springfield Avenue which happens to be a pretty popular cycling
stretch is there a plan to uh not conflict with the city resolution on that yeah I'm sorry I think that really is a question for the parking expert and you'll get an opportunity to ask that of her thank
you for for clarity yeah you're did you move you're so you're your office isn't on this in the new site is that what you were saying that I have an office at the new site yeah new as well as at for Waldron yeah that's the only thing that the only thing there is right now is is
your office my office yep okay thank you which we've been Z I mean we went through the zoning office for yeah hi Christina kogan cogn 686 Springfield hi Reverend Robin hi just one other question about the community outreach
can you confirm that the community out doesn't have any addiction programs or anything like that in the evening uh we don't have any evening programs for addiction we or daytime or anything we do host as is common of many Faith communities we do have a morning AA
group that meets once a week MH and that's pretty common throughout Faith communities I understand the thing that's like not sitting well with me is the primary Center and having it's not a question um AA I know it's not a question I'm sorry but is there anything
about that that we can have where it's yeah not during the hours with children around so Chrissy I really appreciate the question um our AA group does not meet during school hours and does not meet during the week so an answer to
that question but the other thing I would say is throughout this evening there has been a lot of fear about lifted up about people who are unhoused who have addictions who are food insecure um poor vulnerable and at risk
yeah and I'm going to be honest the core of what a faith community does most if not all of our faith communities is to provide for individuals who are vulnerable and at risk and and to
provide that is a core I mean that's why our sanctuaries are called sanctuaries right and the other thing I say behind a school though well chy here's the piece of what I want to say many of our faith communities that in fact actually have
preschools housed in them also provide these other Ministries and I would say individuals with addiction recovering alcoholics they are in our school systems they are our family members they are our community members and our
residents so painting there's a certain amount where these individuals are being painted as if they're these terrifying individuals coming in to uh kidnap children and we have lots of recovering alcoholics some of whom may even be in this room and I I think it's very
dangerous I just as a minister with a moral fabric I can't sit here and and and not say that it's okay to attack the character of someone who's trying to be sober and stay sober and goes to a small
weekly meeting um to maintain their sobriety I think that's something we should praise and support and I do respect that um my it's again it's a playground that's right there kids playing sorry I'll just
leave it at that my experience of recovering alcoholics is that they're not going to playgrounds and trying to harm children and I actually find that offensive hi irn Miller 5 naill Drive are you familiar with what happened at maybe playground last week where a
homeless individual did was accused of accosting two young children and trying to take them I just and was me was drunk and was arrested and pulled away from that as they should have been arrested absolutely but there are also sir there are also many individuals we know
unfortunately it's a horrible thing to say out loud and no one wants to admit it the vast majority of people who abuse children are known to those children so if we're really wanting to talk about reality and the statistics let's talk about reality and the statistics
certainly address that my question is around creating incentives to have outside people who are not from Summit come to Summit provide them incentives to come to Summit and then house that facility next to a primary Center which is that the best place to put that kind
of facility or you know provide those Services we are not doing that I've clearly said we're not having a drop so clear actually well I apologize sir okay thank you rangan r n g n a t h 690 Springfield
Avenue hello again um it has been confusing to understand the difference between shelter and uh Sanctuary sure there was a comment made by the council earlier that there can be a conditional approval to
prevent uh the facility being used as a uh shelter would that also apply to anyone seeking overnight Sanctuary I don't know the legal answer to that well that's not what we suggested we certainly suggested we're
not going to we have no plans or facility for an ongoing shelter and we would certainly agreed to that in writing um Sanctuary is a different story because it's as you've heard pretty rare it's very limited in time and scope and it's also very limited in
occurrence if it's happened once a year statistically over the last number of years then that's a it's a different function all right so and it's a traditional church function and I think that it's the kind of thing
that the zoning board probably should not be regulating frankly but we would think that we as a church it's something we ought to be able to continue to do and I think it's been described in in detail in terms of the controls around it it's limited
nature the fact that another church member is staying with this person and that it's not something that's occurring on a weekly or even monthly basis all right um would you be okay to ensure that the cameras have uh a remote
monitor to say that if someone's coming in and trying to stay overnight in a automobile that you can report someone coming there to the authority saying that hey someone's parked overnight so all of our cameras at least most secur systems that I'm aware of in
our current security system have Cloud software which makes them remotely accessible and you can set up different kinds of warnings okay to notify the authorities in case so that way you would or in case of a Breakin or any number of situations when no one is at the building okay and um so that would
be your plan for security which is the overnight when no one's in the building yeah okay thank you thank you John Burke 29 Fairview AV um a couple clarifying questions because I don't want to get some be might be some confusion in the room based on the
semantics of how some of these questions are being asked and answered um what is outside of regular Sunday service what is the frequency of activities at the church
where there are more than 25 attendees I'm checking the schedule Mr ball will A1 be attached to the public forum and what if so Nicole when would that go up I'm not in charge of that so I can't
it certainly can be and relatively soon so out oh sorry so outside of Sundays it looks you know what reviewing the calendar which we did to do this over a period of years um and excluding covid because we didn't want to falsely reduce
the numbers um it looks like we're talking about a memorial a wedding or a child dedication once every say 12 weeks on a Saturday um um and that's it I mean the support
group also meets right now on Saturday morning's the AA group um but they don't exceed 25 individuals the regular yeah and then my second question is and without labeling it as a specific program like warm hearts or anything
else what services does the church provide or does the church plan to provide at the proposed location for unhoused or otherwise homeless individuals at present aside from that
Sanctuary which is a really limited function about once a year um at most we don't have provision for outside of that not no no engagement with unhoused or homeless individuals on the property at
any time tell you someone will never come to a Sunday service who's unhoused looking for resources no our services are public and open to the community and then we do the compassionate kind thing that many of our faith communities in Summit do which is to you know get them
connected to a case manager or call the non-emergency number to get them support you know that does happen but not with frequency so so no one will be showering for example at the
facility on the regular no as a program at all we may have a shower on site um to be used by or unhoused individuals no that's not the plan for it so it will not be used for that purpose that is not the intent
no it will not be used for that purpose I think I'm answering your question no you're saying it's not the intent which is different so the answer is no thank you thank you Hill Academy 684 Springfield I just had a quick question about the use of the
outdoor space I know that you wanted this property so that you could have more nature and um are so I would assume that there might be more plans to be doing more outdoor activities I know you like is there is that something that you guys are hoping to explore um well the
Labyrinth walking the lath what that actually I know what it looks like cuz I see it yeah so it's a patterned it's a technique in meditation it's essentially a walking meditation is how you can think about it so do people come regularly is there like a group meditation that happens like I'm just
trying to get a do it as a small group but really it's usually one person at a time that would be using the Labyrinth and but like who like just a members just whenever they like and just use it is that I'm just I mean during daylight hours cuz it's you know outside and is
there other plans for like people just to be coming in and out during the day to be using the facilities um that's all included in this document like no I understand but like we have a small meditation group that meets indoors if you're asking about outside on Sundays I
the you know we might take some of the children out to do a lesson on the property because that has to do with the Children's Program um we have an Easter egg hunt that's once a year outside on our property it just seemed like that was a priority to have all this open natural space I'm just curious there has
to be other plans maybe that you might want to use it for or as I've said meditation prayer small social Gatherings for our children um there's a memorial garden space so a time for people to you know remember loved ones
and you wouldn't be planning to like rent out that space putting tents up in case someone wanted to have outdoor wedding or something like that no there's no plan to do that okay garasa s AA 37 Oakley Avenue so regard your
intents not plannings I was checking the morrist town they make like 64 events per month what if you plan later organize a big number of events like 60 because the congregation is similar size
do you mean the moristown Unitarian Fellowship okay so what if you say oh now let's plan for the Bon Community to have more and more and more and more does the community of summit has a say on that or will have a say on that well we would have to comply within our use
and anything outdoors it's not like we can have a big concert there's noise rues talking inside like in the building all these meeting rooms that you have I've already detailed our plans I mean there's not a secret plan to have a large inside I'm saying like what in the
case that you start organizing more and more for example like in the morrist town one I can't speak on the Morristown programming I'm not familiar with so they have 64 activities they have an schedule like yours it has 64 activities right but so what if you reach that
point will you consult The Summit Community or would just organize yourself well one thing I've said is we'll continue to open meetings with our neighbors including the Wilson Primary Center and and be in good conversation and so if there was a problem of course
we would want to work to resolve that um but no we're not intending to have this growth pattern that's what I've already testified to I know you don't intend but what if it happens I mean there's a lot of wha ifs and I don't
know how to speculate on every potential scenario that could occur at a future date I especially after living through this pandemic and trying to do ministry in that I'm I'm not going to speculate on the what ifs
yeah thank you have a question um the a one exhibit that you gave us this is current or like past it's the average of the last year okay and then with the weddings and memorials we looked over several years to get an accurate number
and I did exclude 2020 obviously because you know that would have brought all of the numbers down so with your plans for um your new facility what is is there an updated I mean is is this is your weekly schedule planning to stay the same or I
think yeah with the exception of Sunday of course coming down and I've noted in this schedule for example like note this for warm Hearts there's a note there it says note this ends April 1st 2025 the program is moving to a new location so
where a program wouldn't be applicable at the new location I've designated that so those are the only two things that you're anticipating that are going to change going forward from this schedule is warm Hearts is is is going no is no longer be around and you're only going to have one service on Sunday there's
nothing else I mean you talked about some other things that you know activities that you want to do that included in this programming so for example instead of our children's programming being all inside right still same number of children but we would be able to do some of those lesson plans
outside so that's the difference but it do so this is all in this is inclusive of every of every program that you have planned yeah okay yeah thank you so just for the benefit of the public that who doesn't have this just um approximately
just because the question about the number in Morristown um not including warm Hearts it's probably less than 20 activities that are on the calendar per week coffee hour is a distinct activity
youth leadership meeting something in that range and this will be posted but just to get you know because no one has this yeah what I what I can do is I can send this electronically Chris I guess tomorrow Nicole because we've used Chris
to put things up so if you want me to do that that's please thank you put it right on the website that'd be great thanks yes hi uh David Warren w a r r n 76 beakman um just regarding the warm Hearts program um that's moving off site
have you identified those sites they're confirmed or and where are they um they are but we're I don't want to get ahead of Our Community Partners in announcing that I'm happy at our next meeting we can confirm it but I don't want to get
ahead of their telling their volunteers but it's been accepted like confirmed okay and on the side itself and I apologize if I hadn't noticed it closely enough on the plans is there any type of physical barrier at all a fence a gate of any
kind between the property and the the baseball field the Wilson Park no at all no okay and sorry last question um you mentioned that you communicated with the principal at Wilson were there any concerns expressed by the principal or
that are worth noting to the public not that I recall no okay thank you I have a question um based on what one of the residents asked this question before um do is is there anybody
showering now at the one on walren there is through the warm Hearts program yeah which is the program that is moving okay yeah and it you know occasionally it's rare but it happens that somebody like a child gets sick or something like that
but that's pretty rare well the reason I'm asking is because it I I disagree with it's rare because I've spoken to a couple of these people and they regularly shower oh as part of the warm Hearts program I don't contest that at
all I'm saying outside of that program no and that program is moving yeah please uh Frankie Degan D GN six beakman terce so you keep mentioning that not your intention warm Hearts is
now leaving you're saying can it come back no I don't think it would it could never ever come back not to our new location ever you're guaranteeing that I'm just asking like cuz once you're there there's nothing we can do
about it so if 6 months from now they could come back no I mean that we don't have the same Fellowship space that we have at our current facility but you were saying
with your space that it's movable chairs so right now on your website but we wouldn't have meals in the same okay you're saying you wouldn't but if you left and someone else comes in and they want to do it it would be up to the board and but it would be up to the
board of the church correct not up to any of us I understand your question so you mentioned that you don't hold weddings other than but you just mentioned that all those chairs are movable so so now you have a big open space we've already discussed a
condition yeah Council correct me if I'm wrong the applicants will not operate a homeless shelter facility on the site corre but not even homeless just um bringing them in during the day because right now the warm Hearts I understand is leaving
and and I think we can work with the language to make sure it does right agreed right but warm Hearts could come back possibly not if we have this condition in place so we could put that in we can put in that if the weddings they can move the chairs then there's a big open space because on the website it
does say you have rentals you can you can rent it out we will have I have said that we will have occasional weddings when you say weddings you're saying the service I'm asking if the chairs all get moved now you have a space to do no a
reception but there's all these things that could happen later so once this is in with this massive structure we have no say after it once it's here what is your question how do we prevent what our
fears are because you're saying we're not planning on it so there's any number of fears that we've given answer to there are things you may be afraid of that it's it's not I mean you you know I mean I don't know how toade I think the
biggest thing is the primary Center because all these things could affect these children I understand that I'm a mother I get it I do and I can assure you we will not do anything to endanger children I I don't I wouldn't think you would I actually agree with a lot of the
stuff you do the problem is where you're locating this church is the issue for most of us but I'm telling you on that process property we have children we have so I on the weekend yes but during the week
when but I come into the office and no I know but warm Hearts we've had issues with on walren we've had I mean we know this we're all aware of it I understand so now you're putting that next to a primary and I know they're leaving but they can come back correct no no we just
answered that question three times it's going to be condition so they cannot it's a condition and all the other things we can add conditions into what's that we can add other condition as well the applicants can agree to any limitations on the application thank
you Carl Cary C RFI one Oakley AV one final question and thank you for your patience with my prior questions would you agree that the request for 18 variances especially for things like building in lock coverage and yard buffers and setbacks raises
concern about whether your proposed church can truly be integrated into this residential Community without negatively impacting the character of the neighborhood I would not agree with that no thank you any other questions from the
public all right seeing the leness of the hour I don't know that it's going to make a lot of sense to continue with your next witness I I don't think it makes any sense to start uh Mr chairman at this point because the
next witness is the architect and we're going to want to give him some time at least two or three questions for them I should think so uh I I would think if we start fresh that might be a good idea okay and I'm going
to ask the public um not mandate this but sincerely request that please try and group your questions together I understand that in the course of witnesses testimony that a future question may arise but I
think in our effort to try and expedite this uh but also hear everyone and give them equal time next time we come back please try and keep that in mind that you get all your questions together and try and ask them at one time if possible
thank you okay um so it looks like the next date we had scheduled for this would be April 7th April 7th and um Council I imagine
waving time frame to act I don't know if we're even there yet but absolutely thank you how's our team on April 7th okay that works thank you so I'm
guessing we'll be looking for a motion to carry given the quick turnaround I imagine it's without further notice yes some moved second second Nicole call the rooll Please Mr Kieran
yes Mr Malay Mr Nelson yes Mr Yuko yes M Cho yes Mr feskin yes Mr Chuli yes Mr nering yes chairman leas yes and uh Vice chair is on yes I have a question for
April 7th is this the only thing on the agenda do you no okay there'll be other I think 144 Bean's also on okay thank you yeah thank you all thank you see you
later we have resolution today sorry we have more business to conduct if you guys can keep it down a little [Music] bit all right people we need to take the conversations outside the board still has business to complete tonight
we ate it all down here Nico we have one piece left good keeping this one I told you you I so I can go right to bed when I get home yeah can we what kind of talking about
hours I really don't want to stay any longer know come on guys quiet please thank you thanks all right we have two resolutions guys Nicole you want to read us through
just uh no just tell us what they are and then the eligible members ah so we have Oak no school this is um zoning board application 24- 2234 uh for 44 Blackburn Road and 72
Prospect Avenue the members that are allowed to vote on this are chairman leas Vice chair Zan uh Mr Steiner who is not here uh Mr Yuko Mr Nelson Mr Kieran and Miss chfo can I get a motion to
approve second all right all right um Mr Yugo yes Mr Nelson yes Mr Kieran yes Miss Cho yes Vice chair zon yes chairman lakas yes
okay and then we have John and Elizabeth cly this is 162 oakd Avenue zoning board application 2422 68 the members that are able to vote on this is the exact same uh so if you
don't mind I would just call roll yep um Mr Yuko wait we need a motion to approve make a motion second there we go there we go thank you gentlemen um Mr Yuko yes Mr Nelson yes Mr Kieran yes Miss Cho yes
Vice chair Zan yes chairman luas yes all right great can I get a motion to adjourn no let's stay longer some moved Second Great Perfect all in favor