Proposed Hebron Development Threatens Crown Heights' Historic Character, Says HDC

Preservation group Historic Districts Council has joined the opposition to a proposed development at Crown Heights’ Hebron Seventh Day Adventist School, formerly Brooklyn Methodist Episcopal Home for the Aged and Infirm, in the Crown Heights Historic District.

The sprawling structure at 920 Park Place, completed in 1889, was designed to be viewed on all four sides, said the group. Occupying an entire block, it sits in the middle of expansive grounds designed to “showcase” the building, HDC wrote in an email to supporters today, urging them to testify against the project.

“The current plan’s scale will obliterate the landmark’s prominence and superiority, compromise its picturesque roofline, and even drown its hallmark octagonal tower in a thicket of development,” HDC said. The proposed development will hide the building’s “architecturally significant southern elevation” from public sight.

Developer Hope Street Capital and property owner The Northeast Conference Corporation of Seventh Day Adventists have said that the open space is “underutilized” and that the development is needed to fund the repair and maintenance of the school and its related Hebron Seventh Day Adventist Church.

An online public hearing by the Landmarks Preservation Commission is scheduled to take place Tuesday, October 20 starting at 9:30 a.m. The presentation materials can be viewed in advance on the LPC website.

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• Congregation Members Join Advocates Against Development at Hebron School in Crown Heights
• Crown Heights Church Proposes Controversial Mixed-Income Housing in Landmark District

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