Frequently Asked Questions

Browse through the following to answer some of the questions you may have about the New Building Task Force, the pending sale of our property, or the development options for new church faciliities. These questions have been grouped below into main topic areas, for convenience of reference.

New Building Task Force

What is the New Building Task Force and what is its purpose?
The NBTF was set up by the Board of Trustees in September 2007, and charged with a four-fold purpose:

To continue the search for a new church site begun by the Alternate Site Investigation Team
To begin the process of planning for a new building and transitional rental space in the event of successful sale of 370 Mathers Avenue
To estimate the cost of a new building and develop a building budget
To work with the Vancouver Waldorf School in exploring the possibility of developing joint facilities

Who are the members of the New Building Task Force?
Pat Brand
Roman Czemerys
Sue Forbes
Mark Mayall
Robyn Newton
Vandy Savage
Jim Stephenson
Bob Vaughan
Brian Welwood
John Biasucci, Chair Back to Top

Can the NBTF commit the church to buy a site or decide on how our new church should be designed?
The NBTF cannot make any such commitments. Its job is to explore issues and alternatives for development, to investigate possible leads, to seek input from the Board, staff and members of the congregation as to what we want and need in our new church facilities, and similar matters – all only with the goal of making recommendations to the Board and the congregation. Only the NSUC’s Board, officers and congregation are authorized to make commitments on behalf of NSUC. Moreover, to purchase or sell real property, our Bylaws require approval at a congregational meeting with at least a two-thirds vote. Back to Top

Has the NBTF found a new site for us to move to yet? If not, does that mean there aren’t any?
The NBTF has been actively looking at a variety of options for NSUC to pursue in relocating to a new church. (For a discussion of these options and their pros and cons, see Comparision of Options). So far nothing definitive to buy has yet been found, although NBTF continues to actively explore these options. Also, our search for sites has to date been hindered considerably by the fact our sale of Mathers is contingent upon its rezoning. Unless and until that rezoning is approved and closing of the sale takes place, NSUC does not have the money nor the ability to commit to buy a site, nor, as a practical matter, the ability to interest potential sellers into seriously negotiating with us. Back to Top

Why did Hynes as purchaser from us have to put down an initial deposit or down payment of only $25,000? Doesn’t this seem a small amount for a $9,350,000 purchase, and not enough “earnest money” to make sure he doesn’t walk away?
The $25,000 deposit made by Hynes is not and was not intended to be the typical “earnest money” deposit or down payment on the purchase price. A typical earnest money deposit is intended to be a large penalty amount a purchaser must forfeit as the price of breaking a typical sales contract by refusing to go through with the closing. It is typically set at 5% or 10% of the purchase price.

Our sales agreement was structured very differently at the strong recommendation of our listing agent, CB Richard Ellis, a well known commercial real estate brokerage firm. Unlike the typical or standard commercial real estate sales agreement, ours is completely contingent on the purchaser being able to rezone the property. This means it is entirely possible that, through no fault of the purchaser (the developer), the District of West Van may not be willing to rezone the property and the sale will never be consummated. If that happens, under our sales agreement the $25,000 initial deposit is nevertheless forfeited by the developer, even though it may not be his fault.

Thus the initial deposit under our sales agreement is more accurately described as the admission price to the purchaser/developer for getting the right and responsibility for attempting to get the property rezoned. It is nonrefundable regardless of what happens with the rezoning. Because the rezoning process involves political and governmental decision making largely outside the control of the developer, the $25,000 initial deposit should be viewed more like a “lottery ticket” than an earnest money deposit.

Because of this, at the time we listed the property with CB Richard Ellis, they advised not to set the deposit amount too high or we would drastically limit the number of developers who would be willing to bid on our property. CBRE also pointed out that the real incentive that assures a purchaser will go through with the purchase under a rezoning contingency contract such as ours, is the much larger amount of money and time the developer must spend on pursuing the rezoning itself. The developer must spend far more than $25,000 to pay for the architects, engineers, lawyers and other professionals to do the drawings, traffic studies and other reports, and conduct all the hearings, etc., needed to submit and pursue a rezoning application for a property like ours. That is the real investment that will be lost if the purchaser fails to go through with the transaction.

(Parenthetically, CBRE as our real estate broker for the sale has a completely parallel interest to ours as seller in assuring that the purchaser, Hynes, will go through with the sale: If the purchaser doesn’t ultimately accomplish the rezoning and go through with the closing, CBRE will earn nothing.) Back to Top

Sale of 370 Mathers Property

What’s the status of the West Van Montessori School?
As permitted under our lease with Montessori, NSUC gave notice of early termination in connection with the sale of our property, with lease termination scheduled for June 30, 2009. Recently we’ve learned that Montessori has made an arrangement with the Mulgrave School under which the Montessori society will be dissolved, its assets donated to Mulgrave, and, beginning this fall, its teachers hired by Mulgrave. The goal is to move Montessori’s preschool operation by September 2009 to a new early learning centre building to be built on the Mulgrave campus. We were told an important element in their decision to join with Mulgrave is they expect it will become increasingly difficult to compete as a standalone school in light of the provincial government’s decision to fund pre-school in the public schools.

It’s possible there could be some delay in this schedule, with the Montessori lease being extended into the fall in case the new building to be built by Mulgrave is not ready to open by September. Back to Top

What is the status of the rezoning of 370 Mathers?
Hynes Developments Inc. (HDI), our contract purchaser, has responsibility for undertaking the rezoning of 370 Mathers, and submitted an initial application to the District of West Van in April 2008. As part of putting the application together, HDI did much work, including preliminary designs, a traffic study, and meetings with neighbours and neighbourhood groups. HDI also purchased the Elliott residence at 380 Mathers (immediately west of our driveway) for approximately $1,200,000, in order to increase the size of the development parcel and make it into a full rectangle.

The initial application is being processed by the West Van Planning Department. However, not much progress was made during the summer and fall of 2008 due to staffing shortages in the Planning Department, and because of delays resulting from the municipal elections. More recently, we understand, the process has gone forward much more intentionally, and the Planning Staff is able to devote more resources to it. Back to Top

Will we have to move into temporary, rental space after we close on Mathers? Is there any rental space available?
Under most of the development options we are exploring, NSUC would need to move into temporary rental space after closing the sale, and remain there until the new space is ready for occupancy. The NBTF has made inquiries with the North Van School Board and several private organizations, and has found good prospects for suitable space at reasonable rents. We are obviously not ready to commit to rental space now. When and if we become ready to commit to rental space, however, we believe we will be able to find adequate space at a reasonable cost. Back to Top

In view of the major softening of the housing market, is Hynes Development Inc. still committed to go through with the rezoning and ultimately complete the purchase of our property?
HDI is continuing to pursue its rezoning application with West Van, and has shown no sign of backing off from its purchase of our Mathers property. We note also that HDI has committed a considerable amount of money and effort to date in furthering the transaction, including architectural, engineering and legal work and its $1.2 million purchase of the Elliott home at 380 Mathers last July. For HDI to stop now would result in loss of much of that investment. Back to Top

Miscellaneous Questions

What happened to the possibility of “partnering” with the Vancouver Waldorf School, which was mentioned in September 2007?
NBTF promptly set up a subcommittee of its members to work with the Waldorf School’s new building committee to explore partnering with them -- in finding land and building a structure or structures that could serve both parties. Meetings were held and issues explored in depth. It eventually became apparent, however, that many of the “synergies” we expected to result from the partnership would not be realized.

For example, we expected there would be considerable savings in capital costs by both organizations being able to share classrooms and the sanctuary space – NSUC could use classrooms for Sunday school that Waldorf used the rest of the week; Waldorf could use our sanctuary space during the week for its school auditorium and performance space for school productions. The possibilities for such savings were eliminated when Waldorf informed us its teachers would not be willing to let their classrooms be used by NSUC for Sunday school, and when they decided they would not be willing to share our sanctuary as they wanted their own, full time auditorium/performance space.

In short, after several months of joint exploration, both we and Waldorf mutually concluded that the potential benefits of partnering would not be worth the admitted complications of trying to jointly find a site and build a structure together.

[For a comparable but slightly more detailed account of NBTF's exploration of a partnership with the Waldorf School, please click on Potential Partnership with Waldorf]. Back to Top