By Lara Tushla, Congregation President

November 13, 2010

Dear Members and Friends:

Through our various meetings and communications, I’m sure you have some, at least, a general idea of what has been going on with Fenn House, the mansion on the north side of our church building.  This letter is to bring you up to date on the process that the Board has decided upon in relation to coming to a conclusion.

November 21st – Informational Meeting

The purpose of this meeting is to share the additional information we have been gathering about alternative uses of Fenn House and answering some of the questions raised in previous meetings.

December 12th – Congregational (voting) Meeting

The purpose of this meeting is for the congregation to vote on the future of Fenn House.

Now for some background… First Unitarian purchased Fenn House in 1952 to make room for a growing church school.  In addition to housing classes, it was used for a variety of meetings of church groups.  After the Pennington Center was completed in 1962, the classes moved into the new building and Fenn began to also be used for groups outside of the congregation.  These original groups provided limited income.  In 1989, the University Of Chicago Graduate School Of Business was the first space user providing a significant source of income.  The last space user, Blue Gargoyle, provided around $75,000 in income when they were able to pay their bills.  

In April 2009, the Blue Gargoyle shut its doors, largely due to governmental delays in payment. The Fenn House Task Force was organized immediately after this to identify options and actively pursue them.  The main focus of the Task Force has been to find a non-profit organization to take over that space.  Despite diligent work on the part of the Task Force, which includes 2 real estate professionals, there has been limited interest in space use agreements in the last year and a half.   (Although it was recently shown to a new group.)  

There have been two unsolicited purchase offers from the University of Chicago which were well below the appraisal value of the building.  Several months ago, the Board approved a request from the Fenn House Task Force to get a sense of the purchase market by allowing the building to also be listed for sale.  It was felt that the only way to know what the building was “worth” would be to directly gauge the market by listing for sale.  

Current situation:  We received an offer to purchase Fenn House for $1.25 million (the appraised value was $1.3 million when we used it for collateral on our line of credit for the heating system).  We know that the group who made this offer is still interested.  However, we also know that until we enter into negotiations things can change and also assume that they are continuing to look at other properties.

During this past year we undertook a process to develop a new Mission Statement and have a Strategic Planning Team working to develop a guide for our next 3-5 years.  Through the various meetings we’ve held we’ve heard general information about lots of possible uses for the building and dozens of questions about the various financial impacts of keeping or selling the building.  

Attached to this letter is information that the Board has been gathering to begin to answer these questions:

Graphic presentation of Alternative Uses

This report is a visual presentation of possible uses of Fenn House and raises some questions we would likely need to address if we journeyed down one of these paths. To download the PDF file, click HERE

Fenn House Summary

This grid begins to answer many of the concrete questions raised during various meetings about financial implications of keeping or selling Fenn House. To download the PDF file, click HERE  

Budget with and without Fenn House

The 2 right columns show an estimated budget for next year if we keep Fenn House and if we sell Fenn House. To download the Excel file, click HERE

The Board has been considering our space-use options and financial issues in the context of living out our mission.  The decision about whether we keep Fenn House or approve the sale is just the beginning step.  Each leads to many more decisions that need to be made and some of those are time sensitive.  

We ask you to participate as actively as possible in these steps… and then to offer your support and assistance along that journey.

Please feel free to talk with me or anyone on the Board if you have questions or concerns about this process.  We will be having this information and supplemental information posted on the First Unitarian website under the “About Us” tab, in the section titled “Governance.”  

Thank you for your commitment to our community and helping identify the best solution possible.