Per the motion made in the 2011 Congregational Meeting, the St. Paul Building Committee has been re-started and is now comprised of Becky Boland, Jimmy Scott, Brian Stiver, Alison White, Carold Wicker and Wayne Boozer (Chair). The committee and Pastor Nichols met several times during February 2012 to develop a revised direction for our Building Program. In April, a congregational meeting was held to share our work so far and to ask the Congregation for concurrence and guidance.
Items discussed so far:
- Building Fund Balance now a little north of $478k
- Agreement that the original design is overkill for what we need and can support financially – Cost estimate was well over a million dollars when we first started and would surely be higher now.
- Main purpose for a facility that it is a handicap accessible facility that can support large and small group meetings
- Felt the extension of the existing building would not be feasible due to probable cost, having to cut into the stone wall, tie in and matching issues for the walls and roof. In addition to the cost and method questions, the extension of the current building would present issues as to handicap accessibility. Moving from the Sanctuary to a meeting would require folks with mobility issues to: 1) use an elevator causing congestion as people wait for the elevator or 2) take a long walk down the ramp and down the grade behind the church to get to a ground level entrance on the lower side of the addition
- Need to propose a smaller building that will serve our needs and be within our financial capabilities
- Discussed needs for improving current building – hand over to Property Committee- consider property reserve, memorial fund and/or timber sale to fund – building fund was given for new building, not updates to the existing one
Brainstormed suggestions for a new building:
- About 5,000 sq ft.- initial thoughts are 60 ft. x 84 ft. (original was about 10,000 sq ft)
- Slab on grade to be handicap accessible
- Placement so current church entrance can be used for both the buildings – preserve drive around capability.
- Split block exterior to blend with church
- Meeting area with retractable wall for smaller area when needed. Zone HVA/C so entire building would not have to be heated or cooled.
- Restrooms
- Kitchen with serving windows to both the entire area and to the smaller areas when the retractable wall is in place
- Multipurpose room for choir, wedding party dressing, etc.
- Consider long term ownership cost with building type, insulation, window construction, etc.
- Consider future land use if other needs are established in the future – expandable
Visited Grace, Prosperity 2/24 to Review their Building for ideas
- Their new facility is 6200 sq ft and has a kitchen, choir room, rest rooms, common area with moving partition to separate into two areas, one left set up for about sixty people and the rest a large place, can seat about 200 people, about 2/3 of the main area has tall ceiling to accommodate a basketball goal, storage area, carpet in all areas except kitchen.
- Cost increased by appearance concerns with windows, masonry, roof line, land locked site etc. Cost was about $980k. Congregation had $250k on hand and borrowed the rest from Lutheran men and BB&T. The church school uses the building several times a week for play, etc.
- Avoided requirement to bring rest of church facility to current code by installing fire wall between it and the new facility. This allowed new facility to be attached to existing. This gets around a concern that was raised here about having to upgrade the entire facility if we attach a new wing.
- Facility is sprinkled for fire protection and the kitchen has commercial and residential type cooking equipment installed under a fire protected hood.
- Used Cannon & Associated in Newberry. Joel Carter of Jumper/Carter/Sease was the architect.
The congregation agreed to a revised direction for the building program at St. Paul and the committee continues to proceed with plans for expansion.