GOSHEN—Thirty six people crammed into the Town of Goshen Zoning Board of Appeals (ZBA) meeting April 18 for at least the third hearing on site plans for the Orange County Gospel Fellowship Church, with several people standing on the sidelines.
The fellowship, which is currently located on 17M in Goshen, is seeking approval to build a church and other buildings totaling 27,200 square feet between Old Chester Road and Duck Cedar Road in the Town of Goshen, an area zoned as rural and a scenic corridor.
The issue before the ZBA was how they would interpret a regulation that says houses in that zone can have a maximum 10 percent impermeable surface area, meaning an area that cannot easily be penetrated by water. The current site plan has a 38.7 percent impermeable surface area.
The Fellowship’s Attorney, Jay Myrow, argued that there was nothing specific in the Town code that says churches are required to adhere to the same standards as houses, and cautioned the Board they are bound by the Religious Land Use And Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA), which protects individuals, houses of worship, and other religious institutions from discrimination in zoning and landmarking laws.
A handful of would-be-neighbors to the proposed church said they objected to the size of the buildings compared to the 7.1 acre lot, and the 168-vehicle parking lot that would bring unwelcome traffic to their quiet road.
The plan, if approved, calls for the buildings to be built in two phases: first a 14,400 square foot church with a screened in porch, a children’s play area, and a two-bedroom carriage house, and later a 12,800 square foot extension to the church. Fellowship representatives said they did not know when the second phase would be built.
