Redwood City church faces uncertain future with looming rent hike
A church on the Peninsula that has been helping families for decades as part of its mission faces an uncertain future, with a rent hike on the horizon.
Orlando Cardona is the pastor of Verbo church in Redwood City. He spent Monday night like he does most nights, watching teams face off in a game of indoor soccer in what on Sunday mornings is his church's sanctuary.
"Right there is where people come through on Sundays. The front door right there. So that's how. That's the main stage over there," said Cardona.
Verbo is much more than just a traditional church. They open their building every night from 6 p.m. to midnight for community league indoor soccer games.
On Wednesdays, they hand out thousands of meals from their community food bank.
"We don't want to be a church that's inside our four walls, coming just every Sunday then let's just go home and that's it. We want to be a church that serves our community," Cardona told CBS News Bay Area.
And serve their community they have. For the last 25 years, Cardona has grown the church's programs, offering everything from school tutoring to martial arts.
They've been in their building on the 2700 block of Bay Road, which was once an old mechanic shop, since 2008, remodeling it from the ground up to fit their needs. But all of this could soon vanish.
Cardona said their rent has been increased by 25%, and he's not sure they'll be able to afford it.
"First, he asked me to move out because we were not paying too much and if I didn't want to move out that he was going to increase the rent," said Cardona.
The pastor said every year they've been in the building the landlord has increased the rent by 3% but now with the local tech boom, even that rent increase is well below market rate.
Cardona said while the 25% increase his landlord presented still puts what he'll pay below the market average, he fears it'll still be too much for his congregation to handle.
"As a church, we can go because I have a lot of pastor friends, American pastor friends, that I know that they won't let it close, the church. So will let me probably be in one of their buildings in the afternoons. But what is hard for us is the family service programs because we have been serving this community since we moved in here," said Cardona.
If the church is forced to leave this location because it can't pay the rent, Cardona said they'll have to shut down their food bank, soccer games and other community services.
To try and prevent that, they're doing everything they can from selling coffee and food to even Cardona cutting his own salary.
He said he's hopeful they'll have enough to pay next month's rent but when it comes to the long-term stability of the church he doesn't know and that makes him and the thousands of other people who have come to love this space very nervous.
"This means a lot to me because I've been basically all my life serving my community and I want to stay here," said Cardona.