Neighbors near a proposed megachurch in the Pierce County town of Milton are fighting the city’s early approval of the church’s plans.
“We have no problem that a church is there,” said Phil Linden, a neighbor and city council member. “But when they saw that it was 92,000 square feet, everybody started to say wow, that's really quite large.”
The appeal neighbors have filed in opposition to the Salvation Slavic Baptist Church and K-12 school includes concerns about traffic, parking, rain runoff and environmental impacts on local streams and lakes, plus the loss of trees.
“Based on the review summarized by the City of Milton SEPA official determined that the project, as designed and as mitigated, would not have probable adverse impact on the environment,” said senior planner Brittany Port. SEPA is the State Environmental Policy Act that’s been around since the early 1970s.
The city said it called for 24 measures to mitigate impacts from the large church, including widening of Taylor and 23rd avenues to handle increased traffic.
But neighborhood groups, including “Citizens for a Small Town Milton,” believe that doesn’t go far enough. Linden said the city hasn't fully dealt with runoff issues and he is pushing for a full environmental impact statement.
Neighbor Kim Adams, who works in real estate, said, "I would rather have a church there than a residential neighborhood. It’s just too big, you know, 92,000 square feet is the size of a shopping center."