Scott Swanson
Sweet Home police are working to identify a suspected arsonist who, they believe, started a fire that severely damaged the fellowship hall at Elm Street Baptist Church Tuesday evening, May 11.
“The fire is still under investigation,” Police Chief Jeff Lynn said Monday, May 17. State and local investigators determined early Wednesday, May 12, that the fire had been set intentionally, said Randy Whitfield, the Sweet Home Fire and Ambulance Service battalion chief who supervised the response to the blaze.
SHFAD and Sweet Home Police Department personnel responded to a report of the structure fire at the church, 1150 Elm St., just after 8 p.m. Tuesday.
When fire personnel arrived, they located the church’s fellowship hall involved with fire, according to Sweet Home police.
“Due to the early 9-1-1 call and the quick response of the crew, the fire was contained to the one building,” Sweet Home Fire District Chief Dave Barringer said.
Whitfield said he was able to reach the fire within three minutes of the call and saw smoke pouring out of the fellowship hall when he arrived “and flames were coming out of that.”
“The fire looked like it had burned for some time because there was soot on the windows,” he said. “The kitchen window broke out shortly after I arrived.
Firefighters attacked the fire “aggressively,” he said, helped by the fact that a church member was able to provide them with a key that opened a door into the kitchen, where the blaze originated.
“When we opened the door, we were almost to the seat of the fire,” Whitfield said.
Whitfield said he issued a second alarm, which brought a truck and a brush rig, with firefighters, from Lebanon. Personnel from Brownsville and Mohawk arrived to backfill the Sweet Home station, he said.
“We had a great turnout (of volunteers) from Foster and Crawfordsville,” Whitfield said, noting that eventually some 20 firefighters were working on the blaze, along with three engines, two trucks, and medic units.
Sweet Home’s ladder truck was able to put personnel on the roof to vent the fire, which gave them better control as they fought it, Whitfield said.
“That made a huge difference because smoke started dissipating. We controlled the fire path and I think that saved a lot of stuff in the fellowship hall.”
The fire was under control within an hour, Whitfield said, adding that personnel stayed at the building all night to ensure that nothing else happened.
Damage to the building
The church’s fellowship hall had been burglarized during the last week of April prior by one or more individuals who broke in and plugged drains in the upper floor of the building, then turned on water faucets that caused damage well into tens of thousands of dollars. Church members arrived Sunday morning, April 25, to find a couple of inches of water standing on the carpeted first floor, with ceilings falling and paint peeling off walls.
Lynn said that investigators are looking into whether there is a connection between the two incidents, which, he said last week, are “too coincidental.”
He said Monday that police have a suspect in connection with the fire and “at this point we have seized a number of items from both the fire and that suspect, which we’re forwarding down to the crime lab for comparison.”
He said police are eager to hear from anyone who can provide information. Anyone with information regarding the fire is asked to contact Sgt. Jason Ogden at (541) 367-5181.
Evidence was seized in the first burglary as well, Lynn said.
“It’s a little bit of a waiting game,” he said of the investigation process.
Elm Street Pastor Craig Anderson said the fire “totally destroyed” the kitchen. The building was used for Sunday School classes and other meetings, including church lunches and various special events, he said.
“I’ve been contacted by other churches, other pastors offering assistance,” Anderson said. People want to know what they can do. That’s encouraging.”
The building, which was constructed around 1980, was insured, he said.
“That building is totally unusable until it gets completely redone,” he said. “It’s going to take quite a bit of time, I think.”
Charlie Grove, an elder at Elm Street, said damage to the building by the water was “extreme” and then was compounded significantly by the fire, which ruined just about everything inside the building that could melt or be water damaged.
“We’re going to have to replace eight trusses and, probably, siding,” he said, noting that restoration workers had already pulled out a lot of drywall from the downstairs portion of the building, which is built into a hillside.
The roof on the building, which was fairly new, will have to be replaced, along with the windows, doors, drywall, heating systems, air conditioning, plumbing – “all the fixtures” and appliances.
“The wiring was in conduits, but I imagine it will need to be replaced as well.”
Nearly everything that could melt did, he said, including TV screens and other equipment that had been used during the COVID pandemic to divide the congregation into two groups for services.
“It had to be really hot in that building,” he said. “When you look at it in the inside, it looks a lot worse than the outside.”
Insurance investigators and adjusters are still working in the building, he said.
“They haven’t given me a (damage) figure yet. It would be speculation on my part.”
Grove said one relief was that no one got hurt.
Elm Street’s elderly retired pastor, Ralph Anderegg, lives on the property. He and his wife spotted the smoke and went to investigate Tuesday evening, Grove said.
Anderegg was about to unlock and open a door to see what was happening when he remembered seeing a video many years before of how a window blew out when air reached a fire inside a building.
Grove said Anderegg backed away and reached for his phone instead, a move that firefighters later said probably saved his life.
“We’re really fortunate and grateful that it’s all possessions,” Grove said. “It’s property. We didn’t lose somebody.
“When you start an arson fire you don’t know if you’re going to kill somebody. They came very close to doing that.”