Covenant News

Scaled-Down Granite Bay Plan Approved

ROSEVILLE, CA (November 24, 2000) - ROSEVILLE, CA (November 24) – By a 4-1 vote, the Placer County Board of Supervisors gave its blessing for the further development of Bayside Covenant Church in Granite Bay after the project was revised to satisfy certain city and county guidelines.

The $25 million project will be scaled back considerably after county planners rejected the church's original proposal. Planners challenged the size of the proposed building and expressed concern over potential traffic problems. Pastor Ray Johnston said he is pleased his congregation will be able to pursue their own building next year. Church officials anticipate groundbreaking in the spring.

"We came in asking for 173,000 square feet," Johnston said. "They settled on 94,500 and we'll just have to live with that. But, we're delighted and our people will be thrilled to be in their own home in Granite Bay," Johnston said in a local newspaper article.

The Placer County Planning Commission denied Bayside Covenant's request to develop a church building site by a 4-3 vote on October 11. Church officials appealed the decision to the Board of Supervisors, offering a scaled-down version of their plan, cutting the size of the facility nearly in half and dropping their request from 1,550 parking spaces to 883. They also agreed to discuss building a detention basin to alleviate concerns about flooding and made other modifications in order to gain a favorable vote from the supervisors. The meeting attracted about 500 people, many of whom went to a nearby church to watch a telecast of the meeting. Nearly 40 people spoke for or against the Bayside project during the five-and-a-half-hour meeting.

"We are pleased that we will finally be able to get started," said Frank Calton, volunteer project manager for Bayside Covenant Church. "It was a sacrifice for us to go down in size. But it was a subjective decision by the board and we are happy to live with it."

According to the Sacramento Bee, the church's application described a facility to serve more than 5,000 members. The church currently has about 3,800 members. Project opponents claim the proposed plan is too large for the surrounding area and is incompatible with the Granite Bay Community Plan.

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