Voting and Disenfranchisement
Some of you may have heard claims that a majority of the church membership has voted for the plan to demolish the Sanctuary, and that by overriding this vote by designating the Sanctuary as an Historic Landmark, it disenfranchises these voters.
The truth is that the vote to demolish the Sanctuary was not democratically held. It was filled with procedural irregularities, and alternative plans that would be less destructive were not allowed to be discussed or presented in the vote. The Pastor, who should have been a neutral party concerning the welfare of the Church as a whole, demonstrated an intense interest in the promotion of this Demolition Plan and none other.
In addition, there has been considerable bullying and literal shouting down by the Pastor when the topic of a less destructive alternative Plan B was brought up.
Actually, there has existed a plan from before this pastor arrived, referred to as the Original Consensus Plan (OCP), (also referred to as Plan B), which was adopted by unanimous consensus of the church membership. This OCP proposed selling other assets such as apartment buildings that the church owns which would provide for the church financially for years to come. This plan was disregarded and not allowed to be discussed when the new Pastor decided that this amount of money from the OCP was not sufficient for his ambitions. This effectively disenfranchised the entire original church membership who voted for it. Accusations that the vote on the new, Demolition Plan is now being disenfranchised is ironic in the face of this earlier disenfranchisement.