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Zion Church of Balto., which holds services in German and English, is lo- cated at 400 East Lexington Street. The church had no heat on Sunday.

FIRE DEPT. HDQ.
ALSO AFFECTED

Entry fee demanded
from steam supplier

By Anthony C. Hayes

Services at Zion Church of Baltimore are generally filled with a warm, welcoming air, one befitting the congenial German congregation adjacent to City Hall, on East Lexington Street between Holliday and Gay Streets.

Parishioners attending this past Sunday were certainly greeted warmly, but there was a noticeable chill in the air:  The steam service which the church depends on to heat the 19th Century building was cut off, the casualty of a dispute between supplier Veolia Energy and JBL Real Estate, the owner of an adjacent property which houses Sonar nightclub.

Temperatures over the weekend dipped into the high 30s and low 40s.

From the pulpit, the Rev. Dr. Holger Roggelin, Zion Lutheran’s pastor, explained the situation:

The pipes and control valves that supply steam to Zion Church run through the basement of the Sonar nightclub building at 407 E. Saratoga Street. These same pipes, Dr. Roggelin told parishioners, which once heated Sonar, also supply steam to the city’s Fire Dept. Headquarters, located in the same block of East Lexington Street as the church.

Next door to Zion Lutheran, on Holliday Street, is the Peale Museum.

Veolia Energy (formerly Trigen-Baltimore Energy Corp.) requires access to turn control valves on or off with each change of season. However JBL Real Estate, which recently acquired the Sonar property, is refusing to grant such access, demanding that Veolia pay a $5,000 entry fee.

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Cavernous sanctuary of Zion Lutheran Church was without heat this week, victim of a dispute between its steam supplier and an adjacent property.

Since there is neither an easement nor a preexisting legal agreement, Veolia’s options are to pay the fee, take JBL to court or re-route the steam pipes. Zion Church and the Fire Dept. are in the meantime left in the middle of a confounding “cold war.”

John Heizer, the organist and choir director at Zion, told Voice of Baltimore, “Nothing like this has ever happened before. There was never a problem with the previous owner of the Sonar nightclub property.”

Heizer also noted that the church has a full calendar of events, including its weekly food preparation for the homeless and a brass concert scheduled for November 6 to fund its organ restoration. It will be difficult for the church to hold these events without heat.

Stacey Wirth, a customer care representative with Veolia, affirmed in a telephone interview with VoB Tuesday, Heizer’s assertion that there has never been an access issue before. She said Veolia Energy services approximately 300 customers in Baltimore, using a steam system which has been in place since the early 1900s. When asked about the option of re-routing the pipes, Wirth said the job “would take 10-14 days.”

Rowan J. Sanders, director of marketing and communications for Veolia, which is a subsidiary of the French energy conglomerate Veolia Environnement, said the cost estimate for re-routing the pipes “is not being made public, but contractually, [Veolia] customers are not responsible for construction costs.”

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Baltimore Fire Dept. Headquarters, in the 400 blk. of E. Lexington St., next to Zion Lutheran Church.

Kevin Cartwright, director of communications and chief public information officer for the Baltimore City Fire Dept., told Voice of Baltimore he was unaware of the problem and deferred comment until he’s had time to look into the situation.

Several attempts to reach Jeremy Landsman of JBL Real Estate’s management team were unsuccessful.

For now, the congregation at Zion is left to ponder and pray. Veolia Energy has offered electric space heaters for the interim, but church elders deemed such devices impractical, given the age of the church’s wiring and its cavernous sanctuary.

One member suggested industrial heating from mobile trailers, such as that which is used in buildings under construction. The pastor’s response was, “That would be nice, if someone wanted to donate such a system.”

In the meantime, he urged members of Zion Church to seek assistance from City Council members, JBL Realty, Veolia Energy, “anybody who could help.”

And to “dress warmly for next Sunday’s service.”

Putting the best face on a difficult situation, Roggelin noted that “churches in Martin Luther’s time were certainly much colder than this.”

Tony Hayes may be contacted at mypoetrypage@yahoo.com