Pastor Christopher Benek with First Presbyterian Church plans to sell the Brickell property that has been a fixture in the community since 1896. Benek was hired in 2018 as a “crisis-management specialist” to lead First Miami Presbyterian out of retirement, however it looks like things have taken a turn for the worse.
First Presbyterian Church peaked with almost 1,500 members at one point, but has dwindled down to barely 100. “They’ve been a financial wreck for years,” Benek stated. “Those problems don’t get solved overnight.” The church is facing $7mm in back taxes and Benek has negotiated to sell 2.2 acres of the 3.4 acre property to a local developer for $240mm, a piece that was valued at just $66mm four years ago. This land has been coveted by local developers for years as it is one of the last pieces of waterfront property in the heart of Brickell. For the last 2 years, religious affiliation has continued to decline with membership of denominations of Christianity falling from 78% in 2007 to 63% in 2021. With large physical footprints, but few congregants, many churches have faced the tough decisions of their viability.
Miami with its housing shortage and being dubbed the most expensive city for homeownership in America, developers are capitalizing by constructing multi-unit apartment buildings anywhere they can. In the first part of the deal, the church will keep its sanctuary, but lose its school, office space and full parking lot. However, it would receive 20,000 square feet of added worship space beneath the lavish pool deck on the 11th floor of the bay-front 80-story luxury condo tower that the developer plans to build.
Long time member Cary Tolley, however, has condemned the deal. “If this transaction goes through, it won’t be long before the church closes its doors.” Benek believes the opposition is only about control and politics as there has been no critique from Tolley about the actual build. Some members of the congregation find Pastor Benek off-putting as he uses the words “leveraging” and “scaling” often and wonder where his true intentions are. Pastor Benek launched a Virtual Reality service set which many congregants found a waste of time and money. Pastor Benek held the deliberations and final voting over the deal through video chat, which many members felt was disingenuous. Benek responded saying, “Is the spirit of God not so big that it can’t work through zoom?”