Michigan City to Demolish Incomplete Building on Which Church Already Spent $1.2M
Life Application Ministries in Warren, Michigan, already spent $1.2 million to build a community center. But the incomplete building will now be razed by the city after neighbors agreed that it had become a public nuisance after dealing with years of its stalled completion.
The church's pastor, Bishop Adolphus Cast, told the Detroit Free Press that his church had been fighting to save the building after battling through a series of problems, including local government corruption, to complete it. But God recently told him to let it go.
"God answered. 'The building is just a building,'" he explained in a news release cited by the Detroit Free Press. "Give the City Council what it wants. The reality is, this is not about a building. In fact, the building is emblematic and symbolic of all that is wrong in our community — cronyism, corruption, pride and prejudice and seeking to take sliver out of our neighbor's eye before we remove the plank from our own."
Get Our Latest News for FREE
Cast said his church first got a permit for the building in 2013 and started work a year later. Problems arose, he said, after the church developed issues with an "unscrupulous contractor."
In January 2015, after the church purchased another property they soon started having issues with getting permits to continue the project.
"It was never a money issue," Cast said, explaining why the building was not finished. "The city just put us through all kind of trouble — approve it, disapprove it. They held us up too long. The neighbors thought we ran out of money. The City Council is giving the impression it was a money issue."
Warren Council President Cecil St. Pierre Jr. said he was "insulted" by the pastor's accusations because they had been trying to work with the church for several years to finish the building.
It has "been sitting there for easily over three years and we've been generous to that church in moving forward. We gave them extra months and still nothing. We had committee-of-the-whole meetings. We've done everything to be sympathetic and cooperative and this is [the] response we get back," St. Pierre said of the building he describes as nothing but "some sheet metal tied around some steel beams."
He said he was happy that the church has decided not to fight the demolition of the building anymore.
"I think they're making a wise decision and that will satisfy the neighbors and we'll have peace among everyone again, I hope," St. Pierre said.
The pastor explained that the city is expected to secure a contractor for the demolition of the building at an estimated cost of about $10,000. After that, the church will have to fund the landscaping of the area.
The unfinished building was projected to be a $3.2-million activity center for youths, a gym for children to be able to play basketball and a place to hold other activities, serving like a community center, according to the Detroit Free Press.
