This is the property at issue in the Powers Avenue neighborhood of North Albany, seen on Tuesday, June 23, 2026.
An Albany church’s plan to build a worship center has stirred up residents who think the plan would irreparably alter their semi-rural neighborhood. Signs opposing the development have popped up along neighborhood roads.
I saw the signs when I got on the bike on Tuesday. Here’s a segment:
As reported earlier, the Benton County Board of Commissioners will hold public hearing on the application by Northside Church for a conditional use permit to build a worship center, a storage building and a parking lot at 4500 Powers Ave. NW.
The hearing had been set for July 7 but has been rescheduled, according to the Benton County planning department’s website. The new date for the appeal hearing is 11 a.m. Tuesday, Aug. 4, in the county’s Kalapuya Building, 4500 SW Research Way, Corvallis.
The county planning commission turned down the permit on May 5, and the church has appealed to the three-member county governing board.
The nondenominational congregation has a website that describes its growth over the last few years and lists numerous programs and events in addition to Sunday services. The site also shows video recordings of the church’s well-attended services, for which it has been renting Oak Grove Elementary School.
The church owns the 19.4-acre property at 4500 Powers Ave. NW, outside the Albany city limits, where it wants to build.
It has plans for an 18,900-square-foot structure that the county planning staff described as a “church building to serve as a worship space and multi-purpose facility for up to 500 people.”
The plan also calls for a 2,160-square-foot storage building and a parking lot for about 180 cars.
Churches are allowed as a conditional use in the rural residential zone that covers the property. But neighbors, about 20 of whom held a meeting last week, contend the scale of the project makes it wrong for their neighborhood, which mostly consists of single-family houses on large lots.
As a reminder, I live nearby and have an interest in the outcome. So I looked it up and found that the size of the proposed worship building is 60 percent as large as the Albany Bi-Mart store. (hh)
Two of the signs that have cropped up along Powers Avenue and Scenic Drive NW.
About the size of the bowling alley in Albany. How are they going to get sewer and water services? Is the barn still upright? I find old barns much more intriguing than old houses. The stories they could tell if those walls could talk.
Thanks for the “virtual” bike ride, Hasso. Haven’t been on a bike in a few years, so that was great. I hope the church is stopped from building on that land, but they own the land!! (There’s an old saying that prostitution is the oldest profession in the world. I think churches are the oldest big business in the world! They are used to getting their way.)
Oh, forgot to say, “spiffy new bike helmet!”
It doesn’t matter if the commissioners turn it down. They’ll just take it to court. That’s how it works now days. Just whine until you get your way.
Gasp! Are you saying the people don’t matter?!?!??
Shame on you and Shame on religion.
Someone find out where all this money is coming from….don’t kid yourself about faith…It’s all money & no tax’s …I feel sorry for the 20 people fighting this….your peacefull home will be like I-5 freeway..
I remember reading Hasso’s editorials years ago in the DH. He wrote beautifully reasoned opinions defending the rights of owners to develop their land. He detailed the capricious and unfair ways that governments prevent those owners from building their dreams.
Yes, Hasso, as the D-H editor, was a true-blue, (or, er, “red”?) Conservative (with a capital “C”), Libertarian/Republican….and proud of it. He seems to have changed a little with age, but not too much.