A long-planned redevelopment project proposed by Palm Beach Synagogue will get a second look during the Town Council’s monthly development committee meeting Wednesday at Town Hall.
Council members will review plans for the project after initially deferring a vote in November over concerns about its size and scope. The town’s landmarks board unanimously approved a slimmed-down version of the plans at its December meeting. The project will be presented at 10:30 a.m., according to town documents.
An artist’s rendering shows a redeveloped Palm Beach Synagogue at the corner of Sunset Avenue and North County Road.
Palm Beach Synagogue, which celebrated its 30th anniversary last year, wants to expand its more than 19,000-square-foot space with 158 synagogue seats to a 230-seat synagogue in a 32,000-square-foot, two-story building with surface parking.
The synagogue currently occupies a 12,000-square-foot, partially landmarked structure at 120 N. County Road and an 8,500-square-foot space at the old Bistro Chez Jean-Pierre location at 132 N. County Road. The congregation paid $7.15 million to purchase the L-shaped, two-story Chez Jean-Pierre building and its rear parking lot in May 2021, and it is currently being used for offices and mock classrooms.
Architectural plans include construction of a two-story structure and renovations to the Bistro Chez Jean-Pierre building to accommodate a new two-story synagogue with religious and educational offerings, and landscape and hardscape modifications including a new surface parking lot, according to town documents.
An artist’s rendering of a renovated Palm Beach Synagogue as seen from North County Road.
The new space is intended to house the synagogue’s existing uses, which include a social hall, kitchen, library, conference room, youth center, accessory offices, flex spaces, quiet room and storage spaces, said Casey Klein, a member of the synagogue’s executive board. Klein said that renovation plans for the synagogue do not include additional uses.
“These are all current uses,” he told the Daily News in November. “We just want to put architecture on all four sides. We want to make it safe. We want to make it comfortable. And we want to accommodate our membership.”
The architectural plans set to be presented Wednesday are a revised version of those reviewed by council members in November.
Members of the Palm Beach Synagogue participate in a Torah reading service just before hosting an October 7 Commemoration event.
Town staff expressed reservations about the plans, with Planning, Zoning and Building Director Wayne Bergman saying they amounted to “too much program being requested on this property.”
After council members directed the project’s architectural team to scale back the plans, architect Kyle Fant of the Palm Beach-based Bartholemew + Partners architecture firm drafted a new set of plans that include a reduction in gross square footage from 36,318 square feet to 32,398 square feet, roof plan revisions, adjustments to the first-floor and second-floor plans, an increase in landscape open space, changes to the site plan, hardscape and landscape, and adjustments to the building’s west elevation.
Landmarks members praised the plans at their December meeting, noting that the design incorporated the surrounding area’s character and maintained the existing landmarked architecture.
“This is one of the most beautiful projects that we have been brought,” landmarks commissioner Jackie Albarran said. “With the east elevation, the length is preserved. The north elevation, if you remember what it looks like now, is amazing. What we have to look at is how this is preservation of the existing. And I think that this does it beautifully.”
During Wednesday’s meeting, the project’s design team will request site plan review as well as three special exceptions and nine variances related to parking, setbacks, landscape open space, loading zone, building area, width of sidewalk, and building length, according to town documents.
Seven of the nine variances are renewals of existing conditions, Harvey Oyer, an attorney representing the synagogue, told the Daily News. The other two are “legitimate new asks,” and relate to parking and the size of the two-story building.
Town staff have expressed concern about the two variances, with Bergman calling them “extremely large.” Variance No. 5, if granted, would reduce the on-site parking requirement, while Variance No. 6 would increase the maximum permitted gross building area.
A consortium of condominium unit owners also object to the plans, with attorney John Eubanks, a representative of the group, calling them “a massive increase in size and a massive increase in intensification” at the council’s November meeting.
But Oyer dismissed that characterization, telling the Daily News that the synagogue renovation, unlike the stalled Paramount Theatre redevelopment project, would have no additional impact and no new uses. He added that the project has received support from every one of the synagogue’s neighbors as well as all other houses of worship in the town.
“I don’t think I’ve ever had this where I’m applying for nine variances and I have the written endorsement of every adjacent neighbor, not just for the renovation project, but also supporting the endorsements,” Oyer said.
Other community leaders have lent their support to the project, Klein said. The Sunset Avenue Neighborhood Association, which has campaigned against the Paramount project, is an “emphatic” supporter of the synagogue renovation, he said.
“Anything they could do, they want to do because they think this is a beautification and enhancement of Sunset Avenue,” Klein said.
If approved, the renovations would aid Palm Beach Synagogue in efforts to accommodate the growing needs of its congregation, Rabbi Moshe Scheiner said. The synagogue, which counts more than 650 members, offers a variety of programs, from daily services to programs for women, children, young professionals and special needs populations.
“This is not an appeal for a personal residence or a personal business,” Scheiner told the council in November. “This is something that serves the entire community of Palm Beach. There are very few institutions that you can say benefits every resident of the town. And we are such an institution.”
The Town Council also could review a draft declaration-of-use agreement between the synagogue and the town at Wednesday’s meeting. The agreement includes voluntarily self-imposed limitations of use to proactively address concerns that the synagogue anticipates council members might have, Oyer said.
Jodie Wagner is a journalist at the Palm Beach Daily News, part of the USA TODAY Florida Network. You can reach her at jwagner@pbdailynews.com.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Daily News: Palm Beach Town Council to revisit synagogue redevelopment plans