Urban Warrior | It's God against history in West Mount Airy

TWO MAJESTIC old buildings that sit on the boundary between West Mount Airy and Germantown are at the center of an ugly neighborhood conflict, one that pits God against history.

And, unless someone can bring much-needed common sense to the problem, we could lose both buildings - as well as residents' good will toward one of the city's fastest-growing charismatic churches.

Bear with me here, because this is a tale that takes some explaining:

These two buildings, the Presser Home for Retired Musicians and the Nugent Home for Baptist Ministers, were both built around the turn of the century by two important Philadelphia philanthropists, Theodore Presser and George Nugent.

In recent years, they'd been used by an assisted-living facility, which became the subject of many neighborhood complaints. The buildings were neglected, and two years ago the facility was shut down for health and safety violations.

Adding injury to injury, the buildings were damaged by a July 27 fire that broke out on the back porch of the Nugent home, causing some interior damage and prompting firefighters to smash out all the windows. Authorities suspect squatters.

Enter the Blair Christian Academy, an adjacent school that is expanding and now has an agreement to buy the properties.

Together with Impacting Your World Ministries, a nondenominational charismatic church led by Oral Roberts University graduate Ray Barnard, the school wants to build a new and much larger auditorium, a new school for Blair, and a parking garage.

This would require tearing down both buildings, as well as an adjacent carriage house.

Barnard, who now holds three services a day at 5507 Germantown Ave. to accommodate his 3,000-member congregation, sees this as a great solution to his growing needs.

"We value families over buildings," Barnard told me. "We want to use the site to reach out to children, youth, adults and our senior population. And you've got to remember that the needs of today's person are different than the needs of George Washington's generation."

What Barnard didn't see was this: Neighbors in this diverse community harbor a deep and stubborn love for one of those buildings, the towering, reddish-gold Nugent Home.

"Speaking personally, they'll tear that building down over my dead body," said Marc Stier, executive director of West Mount Airy Neighbors Association. "That building is breathtaking. I don't know anyone who doesn't stop in their tracks when they see it. Not only that, it's an important landmark in this community."

He's not the only neighbor who feels this way. Dozens have turned out at various community meetings to voice their concerns about losing the building, and resistance to the church's plan has been an ongoing subject in local newspapers.

Four different neighborhood associations, representing East and West Mount Airy as well as Germantown, are now working together to try to influence the outcome of the project.

They started by contacting several developers who are known for renovating old buildings.

Would they be interested?

"Absolutely," was the answer they got.

One company wanted to restore the buildings to their former use as well as their former glory, and use them for senior housing. Two others thought apartments would work.

Naturally, the next step was to trigger a process under which the city's historic commission opted to recommend the Presser Home for historic designation.

So for now, anyway, it can't be torn down.

But that's only temporary.

As is typical when neighbors feel surprised by news like this, conspiracy theories are circulating about why the church would push such an unpopular plan.

Some suspect a fix, they say, because the church, together with the school, has taken the unusual step of hiring the two most politically connected law firms in the city.

But I say that hiring lawyers like Neil Sklaroff of Ballard Spahr Andrews & Ingersoll and Carl Primavera of Klehr, Harrison Harvey, Branzburg & Ellers just proves they're smart.

Smart enough, perhaps, to see irony in the fact that the Nugent Home, which was built so elegantly in order to bring proper respect to Baptist ministers, could be torn down by a church.

So here's where I suggest that some city leader (It is in Donna Reed Miller's Council district) step in and offer some common-sense help.

Barnard's church appears to be a force for good, with genuine and productive outreach into the community. He has no desire to destroy a neighborhood, or history either.

He just needs at least 4 acres, preferably 5. And he says he hasn't been able to find another site.

Why not help him find one?

This very diverse and tolerant neighborhood has no problem absorbing another large and growing church.

They just dispute the pastor's notion that it has to be here, or that he has to tear down their history in order to build it.

It's just not a choice between God and history, they say, not with all the land that's lying fallow in this shrinking city.

"Diversity is not the issue here. Our neighborhood does diversity very well - whether it's religious diversity or racial diversity," said resident Christine Tilles.

"It's just that we cringed when we heard these buildings were going to be knocked down. Philadelphia has lost so much, what we have should be cherished. And one thing we do have is our history."