Recently St. Andrew’s Worship Team asked Session to continue scheduling our Sunday worship service at 9:30 a.m. and to approve a proposal to increase the number of pew chairs in the Sanctuary from the current 253 seats. Session asked Worship Team to consider the number of new pew chairs needed, the spacing of rows, the type of chairs (singles, doubles, triples), and to look at memorial or other funds available in addition to individual donations.
Over the next few weeks, the Worship Team took a fresh look at maximum-seating design provided by the makers of current pew chairs, New Holland Furniture, and accounted for several variables:
Marking out space for our current center aisle (at least 6 feet) and two additional aisles of the same width. (That’s the minimum width necessary to allow a person in a wheelchair and a person in a walker to maneuver around each other when passing in the aisle.)
Leaving the rows of pew chairs spaced as they currently are (40 inches apart).
Doubling the number of single chairs with arms (the seating many of our members who have mobility issues say they prefer) and placing those singles along the aisles scattered throughout the Sanctuary (allowing for easy removal by ushers if someone with a wheelchair or walker wants to sit in that space).
Keeping costs down by not adding any additional doubles, just keeping our current number at 14.
The resulting design can be found by clicking on the button below, with triples marked in blue dots, doubles marked with x’s, and singles in red. The Worship Team's proposal calls for adding 99 more seats in the Sanctuary (6 singles, and 31 triples), which would bring our total seating capacity to 352. That would increase the Sanctuary's seating capacity to more than the current combination of pew chairs and gray chairs. For those Sunday services or future special events in which we need additional seating, the gray chairs would allow us to bring our capacity to well over 400.
New Holland estimates that 6 singles and 31 triples will cost us $31,350, with 30 percent ($9,405) due upon ordering, and the rest due four or five months later, when the chairs are actually delivered. As of March 21, we have $12, 266 in pledges and $4,500 identified in memorial money.
If you would like to pledge toward the purchase of additional pew chairs, click on the button below, which will take you to an online form at https://bit.ly/sapc-pew-pledge. (Or, simply send an email to office@saintandrew-ic.org.)
If you are ready to make a donation, click on the button below, which will take you to our online donation page at https://bit.ly/sapc-give, and type “pew chair purchase” in the Note line. (You also can submit a check to the church office and write “pew chair purchase” on the memo line.)
