Abuse Case Leads to Dunes Camp Sale

By Ken Kolker
The Wood
May 6, 2013

http://www.woodtv.com/dpp/news/local/allegan_county/abuse-case-leads-to-saugatuck-dunes-camp-sale

[with video]

Multi-million dollar houses may be built

SAUGATUCK, Mich. (WOOD) - The impact of sexual abuse that allegedly went on for years in Chicago -- involving a youth minister and four boys -- is being felt 20 years later in Saugatuck.

It is forcing the Presbytery of Chicago to sell its 130-acre Presbyterian Camp on dunes overlooking Lake Michigan to a Grand Rapids developer, according to those familiar with the deal.

The camp has served thousands of children over the last century, many of them from the Chicago area.

Photos: Presbyterian Camps in Saugatuck

"I don't think it should be up to the camp to pay for his sins, and I don't think the Presbytery should have the camp pay for his sins either," said Lisa Lenzo, who worked at the camp for 11 years and still lives in the Saugatuck area.

She is among Saugatuck-area residents trying to fight the plan. City officials say more than 80 people have written letters against it.

"The thing that bothers me the most is to have just 12 houses, 12 households of millionaires that can have property on the beach, when it could be used for so many more people," Lenzo said.

Developer David Barker on Monday delivered updated plans to Saugatuck City Hall that call for tearing down the camp's cabins and making room for a dozen high-priced homes. All but one of the homes would be built on a bluff with a lake view, on $2-million to $3-million lots.

"It's been a camp a long time, so there's obviously been a lot of emotional attachment," Barker said.

The Presbytery of Chicago, the governing body for more than 100 Presbyterian churches in that city, has signed a contract with Barker, according to the Rev. Eric Heinekamp, the church's director of Business Affairs in Chicago.

The sale is contingent on Barker getting approval from the Saugatuck Planning Commission and the state Department of Environmental Quality. The project would be built among state-protected critical dunes.

The Planning Commission plans to discuss the request on May 16, but could take months to decide, Saugatuck Zoning Administrator Michael Clark said. He said the DEQ already has started to study the request.

Heinekamp said the church settled a lawsuit for $10 million by taking out a loan in 2007. He refused to discuss details of the case, saying the court issued a gag order. He said the church must pay off the nearly $8 million balance by August.

A former church deacon and elder confirmed the settlement involved a youth minister who was accused in a lawsuit of sexually assaulting four high school boys in the 1990s in the Chicago area. She said the alleged abuse did not happen at the camp.

The lawsuit, filed in 2002, alleged that the minister took explicit photographs and films of the boys and provided them with cigarettes and alcohol, according to the Chicago Tribune.

The youth minister has since died, the former deacon told 24 Hour News 8.

The settlement already has forced the Presbytery of Chicago to sell its headquarters for $2.5 million, along with another $1.1 million in property, the former deacon said.

But the Saugatuck camp is the church's biggest asset. It is spread out among woods and dunes, just south of Oval Beach. A maze of boardwalks leads to cabins, some of them overlooking the lake, many of them decades old.

"It's just a beautiful place," said Lenzo, whose family holds reunions there every year. "I'm not a very religious person, but it feels to me like a sacred place."

Lenzo said she's donated to Lakeshore Christian Camping, a non-profit agency working to raise $4 million to buy the land and continue to run the camp. The group has already raised $1.5 million.

Barker, of Grand Rapids, said he plans to develop the land with water and sewer, along with a road wide enough for fire trucks to reach the homes.

He said he plans to work with residents and the city on what to do with the land behind the homes. His plans call for a forest preserve.

"The camp has been for sale for a long time, and a lot of the people don't seem to have a better solution," Barker said. "It's going to take quite a bit of money to buy this camp if they wanted to do it, and I don't see them coming forward with any funds."