SAN FRANCISCO (CA)
San Francisco Chronicle
Suzanne Herel, Chronicle Staff Writer
Thursday, February 3, 2005
The San Francisco Board of Supervisors wants to label the long- closed St. Brigid Catholic Church a local historic landmark in an effort to thwart the archdiocese's plan to demolish the building and sell the land to pay off settlements of priest abuse cases.
Supervisor Michela Alioto-Pier, who represents District 2, where the church sits at Broadway and Van Ness Avenue, introduced a resolution Tuesday urging the Landmarks Preservation Advisory Board to consider an official historic designation for the structure, built in Richardsonian Romanesque style in 1900. The measure has enough co-sponsors to pass at the board meeting Tuesday.
But Maurice Healy, a spokesman for the Archdiocese of San Francisco, said that even if the church does become a historic landmark, it won't affect the archdiocese's plan to sell the building to a developer who intends to erect condominiums on that corner.
Under state law, Healy said, religious organizations are permitted to reject landmark status -- as the archdiocese already did in this case with the national and state registers of historic places -- and do what they like with the buildings they own.
Posted by kshaw at February 3, 2005 06:19 PM