KEILOR’S historic Christ Church is going under the hammer this Saturday despite Brimbank City Council’s attempt to save the church.
Councillors met the Anglican Diocese yesterday to discuss options of saving the church that might be demolished to make way for multi-purpose units.
But the Anglican parish has decided to sell the historic church that was built in 1877 to raise money for a new church which will be built in the next 12 months on Cemetery Rd, East Keilor.
In a last-minute attempt to save the church, Keilor residents will tonight (Tuesday) meet Horseshoe Bend Ward councillors to push for it to be listed by Heritage Victoria.
Keilor resident and member of the Keilor Historical Society Kevin Rowles said he hoped the residents could convince the councillors during the meeting to “resist any efforts to have developers modify or demolish the building”.
Councillor Kathryn Eriksson said the church could not be demolished as it was covered by the Brimbank Heritage Overlay.
But she said she was puzzled by Barry Plant Real Estate’s advertising sign outside the church that described the building as “offering tremendous potential to create a prestige multi-unit development”.
“Real estate agents have a way with language to try and say the most appealing thing. Unfortunately, council has no say in that,” she said.
Barry Plant agent Tony Catena said the advertisement was never intended to “boost the price”.
“It was advertised as there is a potential for development there,” Mr Catena said.
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“When we speak to people about what you can do with the property, we always tell them to make their own investigations into what they can and what they can’t do with the property,” he added.
Sally Petty, the property manager for the Anglican Diocese, said she believed it was “unlikely” that the church would be demolished.
“ I hope that whoever buys this property would be able to make it work for whatever they want to use it for.
“I need to get the highest possible value from this property as I can to fund the new project that we’re building,” Ms Petty said.
Tonight’s public meeting will be held at the Keilor Bowling Club at 7.30pm.
The church will go to auction on 8 July at noon and agents believe it should fetch more than $1 million.
