Deschutes OKs church theater

After about a year of legal battles, Staff Pastor John Bluebaugh of Christian Life Center church got the approval Wednesday from Deschutes County to build a 2,000-seat outdoor amphithea- ter on Highway 20 east of Bend.

The ruling, made by commissioners Bev Clarno and Dennis Luke, allows the church to construct the facility but subjects the amphitheater’s concerts to the county’s outdoor mass gatherings code, which regulates time, safety and other issues. The church will need a permit for each outdoor concert it holds.

Commissioner Mike Daly was absent.

While the code places some restrictions on the concerts, Bluebaugh said the commissioners’ ruling was fair. He hoped to see national Christian bands come to Bend this year, such as the folk-rock group Jars of Clay.

”It’s an outreach,” he said. ”It’s a tool to get people to hear the Gospel. It’s one thing to come on Sunday mornings, but it’s another to hear your favorite musician.”

Bluebaugh’s legal fight stretches back in part to July 19, when county hearings officer Karen Green denied the amphitheater, saying the applicant failed to demonstrate that it would create a safe environment or consider traffic or other public safety issues.

Some neighbors also expressed concern about the amphitheater, which will feature grassy terraces where about 2,000 people could set up lawn chairs or sit on blankets.

”They’re noisy,” said Verson Pandian, whose land borders the church. ”Outdoor concerts illustrate that by the Les Schwab Amphitheater” in the Old Mill District.

Pandian and his wife, Jill, got an attorney, who argued that the amphitheater was not an expansion of an existing church.

Neighbors of Hamby Road also joined the fight.

But Christian Life Center appealed Green’s decision, and the commissioners held a public hearing in October when the church presented a modified site plan that included 10 portable restrooms and a safety health tent.

Christian Life Center made its final arguments on March 3, arguing that the amphitheater will hold no more than six concerts or performance events per year and will serve as an alternative location for existing church services and activities, such as weddings and funerals.

About a month later, commissioners Clarno and Luke ruled that the outdoor concerts themselves were not an expansion and must be restricted to the county’s outdoor mass gatherings code.

”The church is not being singled out or discriminated against,” Luke read from a written statement. ”These concerts differ from the regular church uses … because those uses do not demand payment for attendance.”

Clarno agreed.

”Concerts cannot be considered the same as regular church uses when payment is expected to attend these concerts,” she said. ”My concern is for the safety of those attending the concerts and for traffic users on the public highway. I feel safety must be the highest priority, and it is our responsibility to provide the utmost safety possible.”

The ruling came as a partial victory for both the church and the amphitheater’s opponents, but, in the end, music may be coming from Highway 20 as early as this fall.

”We got the amphitheater,” Bluebaugh said. ”I view it as a win.”