[MassHistPres] Church sues over district creation

[Jonathan Feist]

A nicer way to spin this is that beautiful, unique places aren't as  
disposable as crappy, ugly places. It's an acknowledgement that beauty  
exists and that we as a society value it. One would hope that a  
church, of all places, might be sympathetic to this perspective.

--Jonathan


On Jan 25, 2010, at 11:17 AM, Brian Yates wrote:

> The Archdiocese of Boston changed its mind about closing Mary  
> Immaculate of Lourdes church in Newton Upper Falls and gave as the  
> reason that its location in a local historic district would make it  
> very difficult to re-use the property.
>
> Alderman Brian Yates
>
> On Fri, Jan 22, 2010 at 10:13 AM, Joey Glushko <JGlushko at town.arlington.ma.us 
> > wrote:
> participants in this discussion might find of interest the "Legal  
> News" articles in the Jan. 2010 APA magazine, PLANNING (see p. 9).   
> In an Illinois case, the courts found the denial of a church  
> relocation to be valid; see River of Life Kingdom Ministries v.  
> Village of Hazel Crest, No. 08-2819, October 27, 2009 (7th Cir.).
>
> Joey Glushko, Planner
> Planning and Comm. Devel.
> Arlington, MA  02476
> Phone:  781-316-3093
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: <slater at alum.rpi.edu>
> To: <acornhp at yahoo.com>
> Cc: masshistpres at cs.umb.edu
> Date: Fri, 22 Jan 2010 06:31:58 -0800
> Subject: Re: [MassHistPres] Church sues over district creation
>
> >Should we assume this is a move because they hoped
> >to tear it down? I can't think of another reason why they would say  
> this.
> >
> >Sounds like a great opportunity to have a design charette to come  
> up with
> >alternative uses for the site and get some developers to pay  
> attention to it.
> >
>
> The church attorney claimed that government is interfering in its  
> ability to dispose of its property, and the attorney advanced the  
> argument that it is constitutionally offensive for the church to  
> even have to appear before government to request permission to do  
> anything.
>
> There have been no stated plans, but the site is attractive for  
> retail development, being a corner lot in a business district. The  
> church already sold one parcel on that corner several years ago to  
> Walgreens -- I think it used to have the church's convent on it,  
> which was then demolished.
>
> I think this brings up some interesting questions -- if a church is  
> exempt from being in a historic district, then could a church within  
> a district (but exempt) that wanted some extra parking purchase an  
> abutting property and then demolish it, claiming that the new  
> property would also be exempt because it is now church-owned?
>
> Ralph
>
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================================
Jonathan Feist
jfeist at charter.net • 978-772-4864
Blog: Delights and Processes http://blogs.townonline.com/delight/
Writing about Music http://jonathanfeist.berkleemusicblogs.com/

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