Church, businesses clash over activities

A church in an Anaheim Hills industrial park is butting heads with other businesses in the area as it readies to host concerts and classes for the community ( race OC Church wants to add new activities such music lessons, concerts and conferences to its offerings and has gotten a city permit to do so. But other businesses in the park are fighting the request, saying the young parishioners some activities are geared toward would be unsafe at night in the dark, secluded area. In 2008, Grace OC, a 100- member church on East Crystal Drive, was permitted to hold services Sundays from 9 to 11:30 a.m., other Sunday activities until 8 p.m. and Bible study on weeknights from 7 to 9 p.m. The original permit was granted based on the church operating while other businesses were closed so that there would be enough parking, said Sheri Vander Dussen, Anaheim city planning director. Because of the conditions of the original permit, the church needed to apply to amend is permit. In November, Anaheim s Plann improved the amended permit. But the Crystal Savi Industrial ( enter Owners Association quickly filed an appeal, requiring the City Council to step in and make a decision about the permit. The council unanimously approved the permit last week. The Planning Commission continued to find that there was adequate parking and that those uses are not incompatible with surrounding land uses, Vander ) ussen said. The new permit allows for Sunday services from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. and 1 to 6 p.m., with some services lasting until 10 p.m.; Monday and Wednesday bible study from 6 to 10 p.m. or services from 7 to 10 p.m.; Tuesday and Thursday music lessons from 1 to 7 p.m.; Tuesday and Thursday services or Bible study from 7 to 10 p.m.; and Friday and Saturday youth nights featuring live music from 7 to II p.m. The new activities won t be able to begin until a few condition are met, Vander Dussen said. First, the church needs to submit a plan to the Anaheim Police Department demonst raficient lighting, to ensure the safety of people coming to the night activities. The owners association also asked for a traffic study, but the city s requirements for a traffic study were not met, Vander I ) ussen said. Traffic studies are only required when an activity would result in 100 trips per hour during peak after noon hours. Second, the church needs to secure the parking. The church itself does not have enough parking to meet the requirements of the permit. The church, run by senior pastor Randy Woolstrum, proposed agreements with adjacent businesses to use their parking. But the owners association said the church can only get the parking by going into an agreement with the association. That s because creating a hodgepodge of parking agreements could pose a safety risk, said Michael Ellis, an officer of the association and president of Coast Pneumatics. We offered Randy parking, Ellis said. Randy chose not to take the parking. This week, ed to start mediation over the parking. Should the church be denied parking, the amended permit approved by the city will be moot. The owners association s opposition to the church s new activities comes down to safety, Ellis said. He said the association would be fine with expansion of activities for adults during the day. But young teenagers should not be walking around at night, in a poorly lit area with few sidewalks, he said. A 14-year-old child in a cornfield, it s a movie really. It s that scary, Ellis said, referring to an adjacent five-acre field that alternates between growing strawberries and corn. But Woolstrum, also a member of the owners association s board of directors, said that reasoning is a cover for the association s real problem: It doesn t want a church in the complex. They don t want a church, and they re trying to think of a politically correct way to say it, Woolstrum said. In r away the rights of the individual businesses to control their own parking. The businesses right next to the church know what the church is trying to do, he said, and have no issues with it. Furthermore, the church already has agreements to use other businesses parking from its 2008 permit, he said. The parking the association offered came with a multitude of conditions, Woolstrum said. Those included paying for parking, never selling the church to another church and signing a document that said if the church were a nuisance it would leave, he said. Grace OC Church is adding the new activities because it s always been part of the church s plans, Woolstrum said, and they also benefit the community. The things we do, we do for the community, he said. The thing