THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, April 7, 1995 TAG: 9504070497
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ALEX MARSHALL, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Medium: 68 lines
It's a school, not a church. It would have 300 students, not 3,000 parishioners. Its parking lot would hold 88 cars, not 600.
But the applicant is still Calvary Revival Church. And the school would still be located on the same 10-acre site at 2357 East Little Creek Road. But so far, city officials are predicting that nearby residents will not protest the proposed new school the way they protested the planned new church at the same location in 1993 and 1994.
``It occurs to me that a school would not place the types of intense demands on the property that a church would,'' said Mayor Paul Fraim, who along with Councilman Paul Riddick, has met with Pastor Courtney McBath of Calvary Revival.
``I don't think there is going to be any controversy at all,'' Riddick said. ``Everyone is ready to talk in a positive mode, so we can all come away from this with no scars.''
Still, council members and civic leaders are circumspect on the issue.
``I would rather not say anything right now,'' said Eloise LaBeau, president of the Norfolk Federation of Civic Leagues, who led opposition to the church last time. ``A school is a whole lot different than a 3,000-seat church. We are looking into it.''
``I'm going to withhold any comment or judgment,'' said Councilman Randy Wright, who helped lead opposition to the previous church proposal.
The proposed school would be for kindergarten through third grade, with plans to expand eventually to include the sixth grade. The 35,000-square-foot building would have 14 classrooms.
The church hopes to open the school in the fall of 1996.
Eventually, the church would like to add a second building of the same size and a gym. Ultimately, the school would have 300 to 350 students, 88 parking spaces and 82,702 square feet of classrooms and related space.
The application goes before the Planning Commission on April 27. The church wants a conditional zoning. Unlike the blanket rezoning the church obtained in 1993, the conditional zoning allows the city to tie a number of conditions to the site, including limits on how it will be used.
The church already operates a small elementary school at its current location at 1148 East Little Creek Road. An associate pastor there, Robert T. Mason, said the church had dropped plans for the time being to build a new sanctuary.
The church's application in 1993 for that new sanctuary split the city and the council. Initially, in November 1993, the council approved the church's application, with only Fraim and Wright in opposition.
But, led by Wright, the surrounding neighborhoods gathered 14,000 signatures, enough to force the city to put the rezoning to a citywide vote. Rather than hold the referendum, the council overturned the rezoning in early 1994.
What was never agreed upon was why the neighborhoods so adamantly opposed the new church. Neighborhood leaders said it was because the church would create traffic problems, force a then-existing farmer's market off the property and take prime commercial land off the city's tax rolls.
Church leaders and their supporters said they suspected that the neighborhoods opposed the church because most of its members were African American. ILLUSTRATION: STAFF MAP
by CNB