Buddhist Temple Finds a Warm Welcome in 1st Review

A Buddhist congregation that found rejection elsewhere in the suburbs was quietly accepted with not a word of opposition in its first stop at Tosa City Hall, and in fact, the Plan Commission offered more than the group's leaders asked for, extending its recommended hours.

Phuoc Hau Buddhist Temple would occupy what is now Unity West Church at 4750 N. Mayfair Rd., which has been trying to sell its property for nearly three years.

Phuoc Hau was seeking a conditional use permit to occupy the building, for which it already has a purchase contract, contingent upon city approvals. Part of the request was to convert some office space in the church into living quarters for a priest.

Not only did the Plan Commission agree to the request, it offered a friendly amendment. Phuoc Hau had, as part of its application, asked for weekday and Sunday hours and to be open for prayer and meditation one Saturday each month.

What the heck, said commissioner Gloria Stearns in offering a motion to approve, why don't we just allow you to be open every Saturday and save you the time and trouble of coming back here if you should decide you wanted that later?

Phuoc Hau gratefully accepted the friendly amendment and will next go before the Community Development Committee on May 28.

A different greeting than in Greenfield

It was a far cry from the reception Phuoc Hau got in Greenfield, when it twice sought to build a new temple on a vacant property it had purchased at Edgerton Avenue and South 43rd Street, once in 2010 and again in September.

Neighbors complained that the planned building, at 8,100 square feet, was too large for the 1.5-acre tract, that it was incompatible with a residential area, and that it would cause traffic congestion.

Others said another tax-exempt organization was not what the city needed and the property should be reserved for taxable development.

In the meantime, a Christian congregation was allowed to occupy part of a vacant commercial development.

Ultimately, the city refused to give up a right-of-way on part of the property, and Phuoc Hau was forced to give up its plans.

In Tosa, the Unity West building comprises just over 14,000 square feet as it stands on an equivalent 1.5 acres, also in a residential area but fronting on busy Mayfair Road. It represents one tax-exempt entity replacing another, but no one proposed that the property should be rezoned for taxable use.