| Sarah Heinonen
sheinonen@thereminder.com
Category:
EAST LONGMEADOW – A request to expand the hall next to the St. Paul the Apostle Church at 235 Dwight Rd., became about much more when neighbors weighed in at the Sept. 21 East Longmeadow Planning Board meeting.
Raymond Casella, of Casella Design Associates, presented the expansion plans to the board for a site plan review. The front wall of the hall would be pushed out 41 feet to accommodate 160 additional people in the space, as well as four new bathrooms, two for each gender. Casella said the footprint of the property would not change and there would be no change to the requirements for fire, water or sewer. Some of the currently paved land will be returned to an unpaved state and, therefore, Casella said, create better drainage and wastewater conditions.
Casella answered questions he had received from Department of Public Works (DPW) Deputy Superintendent Tom Christensen, saying the grading of the land will not change substantially, the utilities will not need to be modified and soil controls and a sediment barrier will be put in place.
He said the hall would not be rented out to public. Instead, he said, the primary purpose for the change to the building is to accommodate the church’s numerous CCD classes and allow for the entire parish to gather inside after services.
During the public hearing on the facility, a resident who lives in the neighborhood with the church expressed concern about “the alcohol and the parties and the late-night weddings,” in the church’s hall. She said that there were “nip bottles” littering the church’s grounds and the property was not kept “in the neighborly way.”
Casella responded that weddings are allowed to go on until the general zoning-defined limit of 11 p.m. He also said, police details are on site when needed.
Planning Board Chair Russell Denver explained to her that liquor licenses are issued by the Town Council and not under the Planning Board’s purview. He encouraged her to call the Police Department with concerns regarding drinking and traffic.
Another neighbor, Alex Grisaru, said that rather than being used for CCD and parishioners, the hall had become a venue for weddings and “concerts.” He reported that neighbors had called the police about noise complaints in the beginning, but got “sick of things” after a while and stopped calling. Grisaru disputed Casella’s assertion that police details are used for crowd control.
Melissa Dieni of nearby Admiral Street commented on the noise from the church and said she had asked them to “quiet it down,” but was told she was tresspassing. She also said traffic cutting through Admiral Street has made it so her children can’t play in the front yard. She finished by saying, “They have no respect for their neighbors.”
Pastor Binh Nguyen addressed the board, denying the accusations of alcohol bottles on the premises. He told the board that there have only been three to four weddings per year in the hall. He explained that there are more than 200 children split into 12 separate CCD classes and the church was seeking to expand the hall for their “kids in the future.”
Glenn Hartmann, who teaches CCD at the church, said that children have to sit on the floor during catechism classes. He noted that he has organized cultural festivals and before the hall was built, fundraisers were hosted outdoors on the property. Proper permits were obtained for all of those events, he emphasized, and said both Springfield and East Longmeadow police were on hand for crowd control and traffic. He admitted outdoor music was “very loud,” at those events, but they are now hosted inside the hall. “I think some of the noise complaints date back to those times,” Hartmann said.
Elvis Tran is a member of St. Paul the Apostle’s youth organization. “Our goal is to raise outstanding Catholics and outstanding citizens,” he said, adding that it is difficult to conduct classes and activities in the crowded hall.
One parishioner who supported the expansion explained that St. Paul the Apostle parish has grown in members since the hall was built in 2011. She said that the programming in the hall keeps kids “off the streets,” and facilitates life-long friendships.
“Especially during [COVID-19], we need space. We can’t be on top of each other, breathing on each other,” she said.
She also noted that the decision on the hall would affect the largely Vietnamese parish, but that many of the people who had spoken up to that point had been non-Vietnamese. She suggested a language barrier may be keeping more people from the parish from addressing the board and translation services would help. “As a city, that’s a really important service you should provide,” she said.
Denver retorted, “Well, thank you for telling us what we should do.”
Planning Board Vice Chair George Kingston said the DPW requested additional information from the site plan. Denver acknowledged that and said he wanted to hear from the DPW about alleviating traffic on Admiral Street.
Planning Board member Jonathan Torcia suggested that the board should set a “definitive time” for events to end on the property, but Planning & Community Development Director Bethany Yeo reminded him that churches were exempt from special permits, the process under which hours of operation can be set, and therefore St. Paul the Apostle was governed by the general zoning hours of 11 p.m.
Kingston pushed back against Yeo, saying that site plan reviews include assuring “the convenience and safety of pedestrian and vehicular movement.”
Planning Board member Peter Punderson stated, “The church has to be a good neighbor in a regular residential neighborhood.” He stated he was a friend of Grisaru. He urged the public, “If they see the church is not being a good neighbor, to make that information available to the town, to the Planning Board, to the police department, and we can act upon any further problems.”
The site plan review was continued until after consultation with the DPW.