by Debra Wood
A church’s plan to add senior-living facilities to its property prompted neighbors to fight back to retain the residential flavor of the Lakeside Village neighborhood. This opposition convinced Windermere Community Ministries to temporarily withdraw the current proposal.
“We still want to have a program for seniors,” said Steve Marcereau, interim director of administration at Windermere Community Church.
He explained that the church unfortunately ran out of time to dispel misconceptions and create a consensus.
“We have a vision of a peaceful life,” said Joan Haughey of Lake Mabel Shores. “Our vision does not include commercial development and high-density and traffic. Churches can meet their vision in properly zoned locations.”
WCM purchased the 50 acres on Winter Garden-Vineland Road in 1997 and, in 2000, submitted a master plan to the county, calling for up to 300,000 square feet of worship space for WCC, as well as a preschool day-care center. WCC is part of Windermere Ministries, a family of churches that includes First Baptist Church Windermere.
In 2000, at the time of the original planned development, FBCW indicated WCC would be a satellite facility. Residents would like the ministries to use the land for what it is already zoned for — a church, day care and recreation center.
“That’s what the community agreed to back in May of 2000 when the zoning was changed, and that’s what is appropriate for that land,” Lake Mabel Shores resident Doug Mikkelsen said. “Nine years later, to come back and ask for more is ridiculous.”
Currently, the church operates a 10,000-square-foot worship center and day care facility, which serves about 60 children per day in modular buildings.
“It’s quite an eyesore from Newbury Park, from Lake Mabel Shores, and from Royal Ranch Estates,” Mikkelsen said.
Initially, the church hoped to replace the modular structures with a permanent facility, but Marcereau said membership and preschool attendance could not support an expansion, and the church looked for other uses for the property.
Late last year, the ministries proposed expanding the worship and day-care space to 125,000 square feet and building a 30,000-square-foot Christian school, 314 assisted-living units, and 54 independent-living units for seniors. According to county records, the proposed development would have generated 2,484 vehicle traffic trips daily.
“It does not fit on this property,” said JoAnne Quarles, who has lived in Lake Mabel Shores for 33 years. “There is a need. We agree to that, but it does not fit on this property bordered by communities with single-family residents.”
The master plan calls for two soccer fields and two baseball fields to be built on the parcel. Marcereau said the fields would be open to league play.
“Nine years later, and there are still no ball fields, and they are proposing an assisted-living facility in the exact location where the ball fields were pledged to go,” Mikkelsen said.
Quarles said WCM does not have a choice about building the ballparks.
“That’s committed,” Quarles said. “That was a contingency on the zoning in 2000. Now they are trying to add senior citizens to it, and that’s a whole other game.”
The ball fields are not the only contentious issue.
“It’s a commercial operation in the middle of a single-family neighborhood,” Mikkelsen said.
Nearby residents have collected 160 signatures for a petition opposing the plan. About 236 single-family homes surround the church site; however, some of these are vacant or were purchased by absentee owners.
“Every person we have spoken to has opposed this project,” Marcereau said.
“The real problem is the density,” Quarles added.
Until the 1990s, the area was agricultural. In 1993, Orange County officials created Horizon West as a planned community.
“The Horizon West plan was embraced by our community,” Quarles said. “Lake Mabel Shores has been here since 1947. We agreed to be participants in Horizon West, and when the county created this plan, we felt the county would have a vision; something to design our neighborhoods to be friendly, walkable communities with lots of green space and recreation. My question to the county is why are the citizens having to defend this plan.”
Orange County District 1 Commissioner Scott Boyd said he has not taken a position and hopes “the folks and the church can come up with a compromise.”
Haughey said she and her neighbors feel disenfranchised because the church presented little information at the first community meeting in October.
“Things were deliberately evasive,” Haughey said. “It feels we were not supposed to know prior to the hearing. But when the information became known, we informed the community, and the community was strongly opposed.”
Orange County’s Local Planning Agency denied the land-use-change request. But WCM is not giving up.
“It’s not our idea to ride rough shot,” Marcereau said. “But it is our property, and we should be able to do what we are legally able to.”
A second community meeting took place in January, during which the ministries presented a revised plan, scaling back to 152 assisted-living units in a one-story structure, and agreed to build two ball fields and add landscape buffering. However, residents still opposed the project.
“The county needs to take responsibility for the plan that was created and uphold what they have agreed, the citizens created with them, and they have won top honors all over the nation for,” Quarles said.
First Baptist Church Windermere Buys Historic Church Site
First Baptist Church Windermere purchased the former Windermere Union Church, United Church of Christ site in downtown Windermere. Steve Marcereau, interim director of administration at Windermere Community Church, indicated FBCW plans to keep the property as a house of worship and expand its ministry. He said Windermere Community Ministries does not intend to transfer its plans for senior housing to the new location.
WUC moved to a new location on Park Ridge-Gotha Road. Kosta Holdings, LLC, led by Kevin Azzouz, purchased the old site in 2002 for $1.4 million, with plans to add restaurants and retail shops to Main Street. That never happened, and the site was leased to another congregation. In September 2009, Windermere Oakdale Property, LLC, with an address in Cypress Point, bought it for $1.6 million and sold it to FBCW.
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