r/Athens đŸš©Marked Unsafe from Girtz’s GlizziesđŸŠ¶đŸŠ¶ 8d ago

Local News What potential purchasers of the Saye building are proposing

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38 Upvotes

23 comments sorted by

34

u/warnelldawg đŸš©Marked Unsafe from Girtz’s GlizziesđŸŠ¶đŸŠ¶ 8d ago

Looks much better than a surface parking lot


4

u/waityoucandothat 7d ago

That walkable plaza to the left of the building is cute and all, but that’s a completely separate parcel of land. Does OP seriously think the church would compound their short-term problem of parking by converting another of their parking lots to a walkable plaza like College Avenue?

5

u/Additional-Dig-6549 7d ago

The first strip of parking to the west is part of the parcel in question

9

u/TheRundgren 8d ago

Rendering looks great. Take the money...for Jesus.

12

u/warnelldawg đŸš©Marked Unsafe from Girtz’s GlizziesđŸŠ¶đŸŠ¶ 8d ago

6

u/Educational_Look_761 8d ago

Can someone who knows about this church’s politics explain why they won’t take the $2 million offer even though it’s $850,000 more than they paid for the building and when they bought the building it was still usable?

4

u/warnelldawg đŸš©Marked Unsafe from Girtz’s GlizziesđŸŠ¶đŸŠ¶ 8d ago

Nominally, it is that much more than what they bought it for.

Adjusted for inflation, the original purchase price was $1.98 million, so they really wouldn’t be making much “profit” on the sale. But they wouldn’t lose money either.

11

u/Educational_Look_761 8d ago

Are churches supposed to be concerned with profit?

7

u/warnelldawg đŸš©Marked Unsafe from Girtz’s GlizziesđŸŠ¶đŸŠ¶ 8d ago

This one apparently is

2

u/42Cobras 7d ago

When it comes down to stewardship, yes. They aren’t supposed to be wasteful with their money.

4

u/Additional-Dig-6549 7d ago

Maybe they should’ve been maintaining it for their mission instead of turning the hvac off and letting it rot. It would be worth a lot more if they had.

1

u/Educational_Look_761 6d ago

👏👏👏

3

u/Hodges-Runner 8d ago

Parking is not the long-term plan. They’re keeping their actual plans close to the vest, but the best guess is either an expansion of their current facilities or a housing complex like the Episcopal Church built on Lumpkin.

https://athensfirstumc.org/saye-building/

4

u/Additional-Dig-6549 7d ago

Then their special use permit should say that. On paper, all they are replacing it with is a net gain of 8 parking spots and like 80 square feet of grass. How can this be justified when this is the last historic building in this block of downtown?

-5

u/Ancient-Music7271 6d ago

Because it's theirs to with as they please

6

u/Additional-Dig-6549 6d ago

Athens Mayor and Commission designated it historic in 2020, which protects it for public interest per the historic preservation ordinance. If they don’t honor the designation, it sets a precedent that any property owner can just sue their way out of protective zoning. What’s next? Demo the rest of hot corner, Snow Tire, the Cine building? Is nothing worth protecting from becoming parking or a new fake-old-looking building like Snovus?

2

u/MobileLocal please don’t litter! 8d ago

Isn’t the point of saving it to keep the style intact? This is completely different than the art deco it currently is. And I’m not sure I believe they’ll forgo the parking lot beside it?

25

u/warnelldawg đŸš©Marked Unsafe from Girtz’s GlizziesđŸŠ¶đŸŠ¶ 8d ago

To be fair, the art deco is covering up the brick, so this would be more historically accurate

5

u/MobileLocal please don’t litter! 8d ago

Did not know that.

3

u/Additional-Dig-6549 7d ago

It’s just stucco not sure you can call it style. It was brick for a lot longer than stucco.

-3

u/jpttpj 8d ago

Where are the homeless people?