[UC] HD Saves Mount Airy From Rapidly Growing Fundamentalist Church

[Jonathan Cass]

I, personally, chalk this up in the HD positive column.    Jonathan A. Cass   -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]On Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, November 16, 2004 8:22 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [UC] Still clinging tenaciously... ? Still clinging tenaciously to the belief that historic designation isn't gonna cost you and your neighbors money? Here's some genuine empirical evidence (you know, the kind of facts the anointed don't believe in) that suggests otherwise. It's from today's Inquirer.   Always at your service and ready for a dialog, Al Krigman ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Church scraps deal to buy vacant retirement homes by  L. Stuart Ditzen   A rapidly growing fundamentalist church that had sought to buy and demolish two vacant retirement homes on a 5.6-acre tract in Mount Airy has changed its mind. Put off by the recent historic certification of the buildings, the Impacting Your World Christian Center in Germantown announced yesterday that it would look elsewhere for a site for a church for its 1,800 members. "We have to count the costs," Sherman Toppin, lawyer for the church, said in a statement issued by the church. "It's going to be much more expensive as a result of the historical designation." (emphasis added) Preservationists and community groups in Mount Airy objected last summer when the church's plan to buy and demolish the retirement homes on West Johnson Street was made public. One building was built by music publisher Theodore Presser in 1914 as a home for retired music teachers. The other was built in 1895 by George Nugent, a wealthy woolens manufacturer, as a home for retired Baptist ministers. Both buildings now are badly deteriorated. The city Historical Commission certified the buildings as historic properties this fall, preventing demolition without commission approval.