The preservation of St. Saviour’s Church, an effort JPCA was and is deeply involved with, and which served as the inspiration for the founding of Newtown Historical Society, has been in the news again lately. Let’s explore why it suddenly resurfaced as an issue after all this time. We’ve delved into its history, architectural merit, and importance to the community previously, so this article will instead focus on the effort to rebuild it.

How it came down
Newtown Historical Society signed a $140,000 contract with Sano Construction to remove St. Saviour’s Church from the property it was originally built on in West Maspeth. A deposit of $20K came by way of a private donation, and former Borough President Helen Marshall funded the rest through the Landmarks Conservancy, which carefully inspected each piece of wood and numbered them so they could be reassembled once the phased rebuilding project was underway. JPCA is grateful to Landmarks Conservancy for taking that project over, as NHS had just been formed and wasn’t prepared to coordinate such an effort, especially one with a 30-day deadline. Galasso Trucking donated to JPCA the trailers the wood was placed in.

All Faiths’ first offer
While that was taking place, All Faiths Cemetery claimed they wanted to have the church reconstructed on their property for community purposes. An architect hired by Landmarks Conservancy created a plan to phase the project so we wouldn’t need all the funding at once. JPCA engaged in extensive efforts to obtain funding for phase 1 and successfully secured governmental pledges of approximately $2M payable to All Faiths. Unfortunately, the rebuild could not begin at the cemetery due to demands regarding rent, use, and ownership of the reconstructed church. After years of failed negotiations, the City ultimately reallocated the money to other pending projects.

Other avenues
Despite these setbacks, we never gave up on St. Saviour’s. Over the course of the 18 or so years since the church was dismantled, former Council Member Robert Holden, JPCA, NHS, and most recently, current Council Member Phil Wong have been looking for alternate locations for the rebuild. We investigated a half dozen sites in West Maspeth, and reached out to Onderdonk House, Con Edison, Amazon, and anyone we thought could help. We had an opportunity to create a park at the original site using 2008 Newtown Creek settlement money which could have reunited the church with the land it came from.

The NYSDEC intentionally torpedoed that effort by refusing to release the $75K the City had requested to get the ULURP started. Instead, it held onto the entire pot of money for years, and then finally released millions to a still-unfinished project on land owned by two people who last year were indicted in a bribery scandal involving an also indicted former deputy mayor. The opportunity to purchase the potential park site was lost by 2012, when warehouses were built upon it. In 2017, the DEC said they still had some money left and asked about St. Saviour’s, but since the original site was no longer an option the money wasn’t, either. An entire book could be authored about just this funding fiasco.

A welcoming host
The trailers were originally stored on a property in West Maspeth, but Juniper Park Civic Association was asked to move them in 2017. All Faiths Cemetery volunteered to host them and said once again that they would love to rebuild the church there. JPCA had new industrial grade locks placed on the trailers, and we periodically checked to make sure they were still secure as we continued to search for a location and funding. In 2019, board members of All Faiths were sued by Attorney General Letitia James for misappropriating cemetery funds, which led to their resignations.

JPCA and Newtown Historical Society have regularly held events at All Faiths, such as nature tours and graveside services for fallen NYPD officers, I received recognition for my community service work from the board of All Faiths during one of their annual General Slocum ceremonies, and they are a long-time Berry advertiser, but since the scandal the board has never communicated that they were interested in starting up a conversation about reconstructing the church. IRS records indicate they had lost their tax-exempt non-profit status during the investigation and it wasn’t resolved until 2024, so it wouldn’t have even been an option during that time.

Out of left field
Late last year, the trailer locks were removed without the knowledge or consent of JPCA or NHS. QNS/Ridgewood Times newspaper reporter Patrick Stachniak then wrote an exposé about the condition of the church. The title of the report was, “FORSAKEN: Why is St. Saviour’s Church, a dismantled Maspeth landmark, rotting away in a Middle Village cemetery?” Patrick also falsely claimed on his social media that we had “thrown it away” and lamented the fact that we refused to participate in his disingenuous attempt at journalism. The article was wildly inaccurate and accusatory. Maureen Walthers, the late, great former owner and publisher of the Ridgewood Times, who started as a civic activist and co-founder of Greater Ridgewood Historical Society, is surely rolling over in her grave over what’s become of this once amazing community newspaper. The only things this accomplished were attracting unwanted attention to where the church is stored, and harming funding efforts.

A battery farm proposal and an inspection
This came about after All Faiths was approached by Soltage to place a battery farm on their property. In a subsequent QNS article, Stachniak wrote, “Soltage has retained the lease and is negotiating with Con Edison over the interconnection costs to join its grid,” but also quoted All Faiths Treasurer James McClelland as having said it will never happen. Well, both scenarios can’t be true, so which is it?

The Landmarks Conservancy visited All Faiths on January 22 to conduct a cursory inspection of the wood in response to the original article. This was arranged without the involvement of JPCA. They declared that the wood inside appeared to be in good shape and far from “rotting away” and “moldy” as QNS had claimed. We then replaced the missing locks on the trailers and asked both All Faiths and Landmarks Conservancy to contact us next time they wish to access our property.

Nothing’s changed
The bottom line is that nothing about St. Saviour’s has changed over the nine years that All Faiths has been storing the trailers on their property. The money that was available early on was lost thanks to their obstinance. All Faiths Treasurer James McClelland, an ally of Dennis Gallagher, our disgraced former council member who chose loyalty to the St. Saviour’s housing developer rather than the community, was quoted in the original QNS article sighing, “All that for nothing,” without explaining that it was All Faiths that roadblocked the original rebuilding opportunity, not the preservationists. Amidst their recent media push, All Faiths has strangely never reached out to any of those involved to start a dialogue about rebuilding or explained what would be different this time. It’s been reported by media that McClelland has stated that it should be rebuilt in a different part of the cemetery, but that would limit its hours of use to only when the cemetery is open, making it even more unlikely that we’d get funding for it.

Paul’s gall
Middle Village Residents Association President Paul Pogozelski was living in Massapequa up until a few years ago, when he purchased the home of another Dennis Gallagher ally, Anthony Como. He moved to Middle Village with designs on running for office. He was not around for any of the St. Saviour’s fight. He never mentioned it during his campaign, although I can say with certainty that he knew about it. Prior to Phil Wong and Alicia Vaichunas jumping into the race, I met with Paul and explained it all to him and asked him to keep it in mind should he become council member. Thinking he had good intentions, I offered to work on his campaign, but he declined, instead hiring Robert Hornak, another Dennis Gallagher ally. After the primary, I was hired to do campaign work for Phil Wong, and right after he took office last month, the stalled rebuilding effort suddenly became priority number one for Paul. He testified during the CB5 public forum that St. Saviour’s was “rotting away” and on Facebook accused JPCA of exhibiting “a troubling lack of concern.” He then dedicated most of his organization’s February meeting to an effort they had never been involved with, without asking those who were to participate. Other civic priorities have taken a backseat to his newfound obsession with a project he had nothing to do with.

We always appreciate a good faith discussion about the reconstruction potential of St. Saviour’s, but this recent attention is more about a sore loser looking to get his name out there for his next run for office, and not a genuine interest in bringing about a project with a local benefit. At his meeting, Pogozelski pitched rebuilding the church on Long Island, among several other silly suggestions. He also stated that the community was blindsided by City of Yes, meanwhile it had been talked about for years,with he himself having advised his group not to donate to the lawsuit for it last year, which is the only way to stop it. This man is not to be taken seriously as a voice of the community.

Looking toward the future
Despite how others have tried to portray our efforts, St. Saviour’s remains important to us, and we never stopped working on it. Council Member Wong met with Council Speaker Julie Menin and Mayor Zohran Mamdani and told us both seemed intrigued by the idea of rebuilding a historic structure with a community purpose and that funding discussions would follow. Thankfully, before he left the council, Bob Holden obtained buy-in from a renowned organization to assist with the rebuilding of the church as a community facility, which is crucial for funding allocation. Neither Maspeth nor Middle Village currently have anything like what is being proposed, and we believe our members and the greater community will be supportive of a new amenity for our neighborhood, which the City seems to pass over regularly when it comes to cultural investment. There is a common misconception that discretionary funding allocations for non-profit capital improvements such as St. Saviour’s compete with the funding of City agency infrastructure projects like sewers and parks, but that is simply incorrect. However, this project cannot move forward without a place to build it.

To be continued…
Despite the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission’s failure to protect it, St. Saviour’s continues to have our attention, but unlike those with ulterior motives, we don’t feel the need to shout about it from the rooftops until we have actual news to share. A civic association’s purpose is to look out for and protect the community in real time. JPCA’s ability to simultaneously deal with multiple concerns and prioritize our efforts is why we remain the largest civic organization in the city. We understand that fighting unwanted intrusions and resolving everyday issues come first, so that is where most of our time is dedicated. When we are ready to move forward with St. Saviour’s, we will release all the details and invite feedback. But right now, we are laser focused on opposing proposed battery farms in the vicinity of PS/IS128, including any potential proposals at All Faiths. The best interests of our communities will always come first.