Ocean Park Baptist Church Update

Following community discussions last summer about this historic building in Ocean Park, the developer has redesigned their plans for the Ocean Park Baptist Church and surrounding property. The new plan was discussed at the June meeting. The civic league routinely does not get involved with residential variance requests, nor has it been involved in the past since 2014 when the civic league voted to discontinue the practice. The civic league is reticent to take sides between neighbors.

Plan for the Church:

• The Church built in 1949 will stay in its original footprint and is non-conforming.
• The Church building was built too close to the property lines and outside of the current setback requirements.
• 2 variances being requested from the city are for those corners so the building can remain as it is today. 
• The Church building’s back corner was built over a lot line and will have to be removed. 
• Since this corner will be demolished and rebuilt, a setback variance is being requested from 10 feet to 5 feet so as much of the church building can be saved as possible. 
• Lot coverage will be decreased because of the removal of this corner.
• No Parking Variance is being requested for the entire property. The church property contains 4 onsite parking spaces for the church conversion into a duplex.
• No Live Oak Trees will be removed.

Plan for the new duplexes being built:

• The current cinder block Gymnasium sits on two lots and will be demolished for new construction. The asphalt parking lot will be removed. There are no live oaks on these lots. 
• Both duplex zoned lots are currently non-conforming in size.
• They are less than 50ft wide, are irregular shaped and are 40% smaller than any other given duplex lot in Ocean Park. 
• 2 floor area variances are being requested.
• No set back variances are being requested for these duplex properties.
• Lot coverage will decrease from its current coverage, lot 7 will decrease from 41% to 32%.
• Lot 7 floor area variance is for 193 square feet (209%)
• Lot 8 floor area variance is for 366 square feet (219%)
• Lot 8 is currently 300 square feet smaller in size than Lot 7 which is why the floor area variance is larger. 

Letters in regard to the requests for variances can be sent to bza@vbgov.com.