BROKEN ARROW, Okla. — Members of the Broken Arrow City Council met Jan. 12 for a special meeting involving the rezoning and permit applications connected to a proposed Islamic center.
The vote was denied 4-1, strictly citing feasibility concerns.
The Broken Arrow Planning Commission voted to approve the zoning change in December. The Islamic Society of Tulsa already owns the land it wanted to build on.
However, thousands of people turned to social media to voice their disapproval with the commission's decision. Last week, hundreds of people gathered at the Property Event Center to organize opposition to the mosque.
City of Broken Arrow hosted the meeting at NSU-Broken Arrow to accommodate the more than one thousand attendees and 400 people who signed up to speak during public comment.
Speakers granted access to address the council for three minutes each before the vote were took up about two and a half hours before Mayor Debra Wimpee ended public comments, citing repetitive comments from both supporters and opponents of the rezoning proposal.
In the council vote itself, only Vice Mayor Johnnie Parks voted against his colleagues.
After the meeting, Mayor Debra Wimpee doubled down to local media that her vote to deny the rezoning was based strictly on a lack of sufficient infrastructure on Olive Avenue for the influx of weekly traffic to a mosque.
"I was really upset that a lot of people brought it about religion and that's not what that vote was for, in my opinion," Mayor Wimpee told 2 News. "(The planning commission's) job is kind of different than (the council) in the way that they looked at it clearly as, 'It is legal to be able to change it to commercial.' Like, they have that ability to change it. And it was a split vote when it came to the special use (permitting), which I didn't necessarily agree with them splitting the vote because it was a one agenda item and it should have remained a one agenda item. But that's their role. They get too make those decisions. They felt that...it was an OK vote for the sequential use and four people thought it was OK to change it to commercial."
"My message is that (our vote) had nothing to do with the place of assembly," Mayor Wimpee added. "(The land) wasn't even prepared for commercial use,much less adding commercial use and a place of assembly. There is not infrastructure in place to be able to do that. I'm talking about the road right in front that is not prepared, and it won't be in at least ten years.
Mayor Wimpee also said she had no information beforehand that Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond planned to investigate the proposal and did not speak with him about the mosque issue.
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