Answer Woman: Will West Asheville Presbyterian Church on Haywood Road be torn down?

ASHEVILLE - Today's burning question is about rumored plans to demolish a West Asheville church. Got a question for Answer Man or Answer Woman? Email Executive Editor Karen Chávez at KChavez@citizentimes.com and your question could appear in an upcoming column.

Question: Is the West Asheville Presbyterian Church on Haywood Road being torn down? Why? How old is it? Can’t it be saved? Does it qualify as an historic structure? If it’s torn down, what would go in its place?

Answer: The answer to most of these questions lay with the Presbytery of Western North Carolina, which is the regional governing body for the Presbyterian church, spanning 94 congregations and over 13,000 members.

When a congregation decides to dissolve, its property reverts back to the Presbyterian church, and that's what happened here — Buncombe County Property Records indicates the church and its surrounding land, all 1.39 acres, was deeded by the West Asheville Presbyterian Church back to the Presbytery of Western North Carolina in December 2021.

From there, said Cameron Murchison, stated clerk of the WNC presbytery, the property of the congregation is the responsibility of the presbytery to take care of thereafter.

Let's take these one at a time.

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Is the West Asheville Presbyterian Church on Haywood Road being torn down?

An administrative commission was created, responsible for both closing the West Asheville congregation and discerning what's next for the property. Co-chair of the commission, Marcia Mount Shoop, pastor/head of staff with Grace Covenant Presbyterian Church, said while much is still being determined, the church building will come down.

“We have already voted that the building has to be razed,” Mount Shoop said. "We had a consultant look at the building, and do an analysis of what's possible, and they felt that it needed to be torn down."

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Why?

Murchison said it's not happening now, but the building will be demolished in the future.

“Analyses we had done of the building structure indicates that the cost of bringing it to code is pretty substantial and that it might be better to not plan to maintain that building, but try to develop something different on that property," he said.

Age, structural issues, general disrepair and "hazardous substances" mean it would "cost more to renovate than to start over," Mount Shoop added.

How old is it?

According to Patrick Johnson at First Presbyterian Church of Asheville, the other co-chair of the administrative commission, the congregation of West Asheville Presbyterian was started out of the First Presbyterian, located on Church Street in downtown Asheville. First Presbyterian planted a number of churches in the area between 1873 and 1950s, he said, and this was one of them.

For a few more details, I took a quick trip to the Buncombe County Special Collection on the lower level of Pack Memorial Library downtown.

An article from The Asheville Citizen, dated Jan. 28, 1924, indicated that the West Asheville Presbyterian Church had been in existence since 1913, and began with Rev. P. P. Winn, who started an afternoon Sunday School in the "upper room of a store."

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They began meeting in a temporary building in 1916 with about 41 members.

A Sep. 24, 1921 article announced the construction of the building that would become the church at 690 Haywood Rd. The cost? $35,000.

The total appraised value of the property now is $4.9 million, with $3.6 million of that the building itself.

"The new building will be on the site of the present frame structure which is to be rolled to the rear of the church lot and will be used temporarily as a Sunday school room," read the 1921 article.

The church was opened June 18, 1922, according to a clipping from that same day.

"(The church) is declared to be one of the prettiest examples of church architecture for a structure of its size in the United States," the article said. "No plans have been spared in making the church complete in every detail. From cellar to dome the new building is modern in every respect."

The article said the church had a membership of 250 people, and additions were already planned.

Built in "colonial style" with "four massive columns in the front," the church featured "eight large art glass windows, each 16 feet high."

Over the years, as planned, several additions were made to the church, the most recent in 1960, according to property records.

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Can’t it be saved?

The intention of the Presbytery seems to be to "save" the property in one form or another, if not the building itself.

Does it qualify as an historic structure?

The building is not located in a historic overlay or listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

If it’s torn down, what would go in its place?

Mount Shoop said there are no plans to sell the property to a developer, and the intent is for the Presbytery to stay involved with the next phase of its life.

“But I would say, again, as we cultivate an equity lens and think about reparative steps, we haven’t taken anything off the table in terms of the way other partners are involved in this," she said.

Murchison echoed that they are not looking to outright sell the property, and are intending to establish new community partners and create something new.

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“We don’t want to abandon ministry on this site, but we are now trying to determine what exactly the shape of the ministry is going to be," he said.

Mount Shoop said they want to invite more people to the table, especially Black and brown residents, to be part of the process.

"I don't feel it should just be the presbytery's decision," she said.

“I have a deep commitment to racial equity and to the work of equity and reparative steps in this community around race, so part of my role on the commission has to ask the commission to really cultivate an equity lens in the way we make decisions about what’s next for the property."

Johnson added that the commission feels very hopeful about the property's future. With so much "social need" in the West Asheville area, and work done by different nonprofits over the years, he said, citing The Steady Collective and Asheville Poverty Initiative, “our hope is that this property and land can be used to meet this need."

People can contact the Presbytery of Western North Carolina at 828-438-4217.

Sarah Honosky is the city government reporter for the Asheville Citizen Times, part of the USA TODAY Network. News Tips? Email shonosky@citizentimes.com or message on Twitter at @slhonosky. Please support local, daily journalism with a subscription to the Citizen Times.

This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Answer Woman: What is the future of a West Asheville church?