Plans Delayed To Demolish Sunset Park Church For Affordable Housing And Pre-K

SUNSET PARK – Plans to demolish the 110-year-old Zion Norwegian Lutheran Church located at 6309 4th Avenue (at 63rd Street) to make way for affordable apartments for seniors and a pre-K school have been put on hold for several months, Brooklyn Daily reports.

The church was scheduled to be razed at the end of last year, the article states, however following the passing of the Republican tax plan in December, a representative of the Fifth Avenue Committee, who will be developing the site, says the demolition will now happen around July 2018 at the earliest.

The Republican tax plan cuts low-income housing tax credits that support the construction of affordable properties which organizations like the Fifth Avenue Committee rely on for funding, according to Brooklyn Daily. As a result of the new tax plan, the Fifth Avenue Committee lost about 15% of its funding for the Sunset Park project, the article notes, or approximately $4M to $5M. The committee has applied for additional tax credits and is awaiting approval.

The project will stand eight to nine stories tall and include 56 studio apartments and 28 one-bedrooms, with eight units being built in two brownstones (414 and 416 63rd Street) on the property which will be renovated for adaptive re-use, Brooklyn Daily notes. Seventy-four of the apartments will be set aside for seniors (62-years-old and up) with incomes less than 50-percent of the area median income (AMI), or $33,400 for an individual and $38,200 for a couple, according to the article. Twenty-six of the units will be reserved for formerly homeless seniors.

The project will also include an approximately 15,000-square-foot pre-K school.

The church is a contributing historic building located within the Sunset Park Historic District, according to a July 2017 NYC Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) Public Notice regarding the project’s potential impact on the surrounding historic district. The Fifth Avenue Committee conducted a feasibility study to determine whether the existing church could be adaptively reused or a portion of it could be retained, and concluded that its only option is demolishing the church and building a new structure to accommodate the affordable senior housing units and pre-K school.

Founded in 1978, the Fifth Avenue Committee is a nonprofit community development organization that develops and manages affordable housing and community facilities, organizes residents and workers, and fights against displacement caused by gentrification.

The Zion Norwegian Lutheran Church was founded in 1908. In the 1930s, the church’s congregation was more than 1,000 strong, however many of those who attended the church moved out of Sunset Park over the years, and by 1995, the number of congregants dwindled to approximately 30, according to the HPD notice. The church held its final service in January 2014.