Zoning Board continues hearing on proposed Mormon meetinghouse

By Brock Parker, Globe Correspondent

Opponents of the design of a Mormon meetinghouse proposed for Route 9 in Brookline will have to wait another two weeks to make their case, after the town's Zoning Board Thursday scheduled another hearing on the project.

After the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints presented their meetinghouse design Thursday, Zoning Board member Jesse Geller announced opponents to the proposal will be given the opportunity to speak at a hearing on April 29.

Many of the more than 75 people who attended the hearing began to file out of the room when they realized they were not going to be allowed to speak for two more weeks.

The church needs a special permit from the Zoning Board, in part because the meetinghouse is larger than local zoning laws allow. The building would be 33 feet tall with a 72-foot steeple, and would have underground parking for about 150 vehicles and an entrance off Boylston Street, also know as Route 9.

Maurice Hiers, president of the church’s Boston Stake, told the board Thursday that the church realized years ago that it would need a new building to accommodate a growing membership.

The church purchased the property at 603 Boylston Street in 2007, and Hiers said it means a lot to the church that the meetinghouse is being built in Brookline and he urged the Zoning Board to approve the design.

“History shows that we make good neighbors, and we will be good neighbors,” Hiers said.
But neighbors and a growing number of other Brookline residents and politicians are urging the Zoning Board not to grant the special permits for the meetinghouse.

Gerry Oster, who lives in Fisher Hill Estates next to the proposed meetinghouse, said that more than 500 people have now signed a letter in opposition to the project, which he said is too big for the small lot, which is slightly larger than an acre.

Oster said Thursday that he and his neighbors on Caitlin Road next to the site of the proposed meetinghouse have hired an attorney to represent their case to the Zoning Board.

Joe Geller, a former Brookline selectmen now working for Stantec Inc., a planning and landscape architecture firm that has been hired by the church, said the size of the meetinghouse is comparable to a number of other churches and synagogues in Brookline.

Geller said if the Mormon meetinghouse design did not include a vaulted ceiling for the chapel and an underground parking garage, the square footage of the structure would not exceed local zoning laws.

The church included the underground parking garage in the design to appease the neighbors.

Jesse Geller said the members of the Zoning Board will tour the site of the proposed church next Wednesday morning.

The next hearing will be at 7 p.m., Thursday, April 29 in Brookline Town Hall.

--brock.globe@gmail.com