OPPOSITION IS OPPORTUNITY

I should have known it wouldn’t be easy! Nothing worthwhile ever is. Every good idea is opposed by somebody.  But opposition is an opportunity.  We get to learn, grow, build consensus, expand our supporters, and unite in prayer.  We will get our approval from the city.  But it will take all of us.

WHEN YOU ASSUME IT MAKES . . .

We went to the City Planning Commission meeting to get our Conditional Use Permit approved. The city staff has been working with us for the last six months to address the issues of parking, architectural control, environmental impact, traffic, etc. We hired outside engineers (they picked) to do a traffic and parking study. The traffic and parking studies all came out in our favor and the city staff recommended overwhelmingly approving our request!

We gave notice to the residents and building owners around the project and posted a sign on the street in front of the center so people would know about the meeting and have an opportunity to oppose it if they were in opposition. No one opposed it. Instead of this working in our favor, some of the commissioners questioned whether the other tenants of the center had been given notice.

A combination of the personal interests and feelings of certain commissioners seemed to override the science and recommendations of the city staff and engineers. The good news is that there is no legitimate reason for them to oppose our church being here.  We need to pray that they would see that and we need to do everything we can to make them comfortable approving it.  If they deny it, we can still go to the city council and they can  approve it. We just have more work to do building consensus.

The bottom line is that the comissioners continued the public hearing until November 14th. We will come back ready to prove that the other tenants support our project, that we have adequate parking, and that the street widening they recently approved will alleviate any of their concerns about traffic. We will also need to show up with as many people as possible who live in San Juan. While some can speak in favor of it, we mainly just need to show them there are a lot of people who want this to happen!

SO HERE IS WHAT I NEED FROM YOU:

1. Pray daily for wisdom and favor for our team and openness for the commissioners.
2. Gather with us for a special prayer meeting on Sunday, Nov. 12th at the new building at 5 PM. We will gather to pray for the city, the building owners and tenants and for our approval.
3. Join us at the meeting November 14th at 6:30 PM at San Juan city hall. Let’s help them see there are more for us than against us.

If you have other ideas or connections with commissioners, feel free to send emails or make phone calls. If the facts don’t convince them, maybe showing them how much our church is loved and supported will!

Thanks,
Todd