DEL.ICIO.USS. DeKalb’s Berean church has big plans for growth
Restaurant, luxury apartments, shopping plaza and 5,000-seat sanctuary planned
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Thursday, October 02, 2008
A south DeKalb County church could transform a sleepy residential pocket off Panola Road with an ambitious $27 million expansion plan.
Representatives of Berean Christian Church, which routinely ties up traffic in front of its Young Road sanctuary for three Sunday services, are scheduled to appear at a community meeting at 7 p.m. Thursday to discuss the proposal.
Kent D. Johnson/kdjohnson@ajc.com
Traffic backs up on Young Road while residents wait to enter Berean Christian Church for Sunday service. The church is looking to double its acreage and include a day care center, office space, apartments and a restaurant on the property.
Kent D. Johnson/kdjohnson@ajc.com
A full parking lot causes traffic backs up on Young Road at Berean Christian Church for one of three services on a recent Sunday.
They’ll talk about their plans to nearly double their acreage — including building a new 5,000-seat sanctuary, a day care center, office space, luxury apartments, a retail shopping plaza and a restaurant. It’s a vision that stuns some of Berean’s neighbors in an area that has very little retail and even fewer places to find a meal beyond fast food.
“We want to make the campus a self-sustaining environment where people can eat, live, work, play and worship,” said Robert L. Howze Jr., chief financial officer for the 9,000-member church.
Beyond that, the church wants to extend its reach into the community, Howze said.
“We want to have the church and the community come alongside each other to deal not only with the social ills of our day but to empower the community,” he said.
Thursday’s meeting will be at Berean’s community center, at 2440 Young Road, which is about 50 yards away from one of the main entrances to the Hidden Hills community.
Residents there are keeping careful watch over Berean’s plans. The Hidden Hills Civic Association supports the church’s traffic improvement effort, but wants to see more specifics before approving the rest of the expansion plan, said Kathryn Brice, the association’s president.
“We’re concerned about quality,” Brice said.
Berean hopes to begin its five- to seven-year expansion in December, starting by adding two more entrances to the church property. “We have been dealing with one way in and one way out,” Howze said.
In the meantime, Berean is buying adjacent property to grow from 21 acres to 39 acres.
Plans are for its existing church, which seats 1,400, to become an arts and entertainment center and to house an expansion of Berean’s school, with one grade added each year up to eighth grade.
The school currently serves 140 children in pre-k to third grade in a two-story Family Life Center, which also has a gym and meeting rooms. The current 600 parking spaces on the campus would increase to 2,900 spaces under the plan, including a 400-space parking deck.
The Hidden Hills group, which is developing an overlay plan for an area bounded by Redan Road, Covington Highway, Panola Road and South Hairston Road, is interested in retail and restaurant development and will support Berean if it fits the overlay plan’s mission, Brice said.
Outside Hidden Hills, Danielle Dorsey is concerned about losing her neighbors on Bell Circle, a secluded, heavily forested street where five homes and undeveloped acreage are being acquired by Berean.
Dorsey, who lives on four acres, said she doesn’t want to move but doesn’t want hers to be one of the few homes left standing.
“I’m all for change and for bettering the community,” she said, “but they’re destroying some people’s lives to make it better for others.”
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