New Hope Baptist Church, long an icon of East Central, plans for new home

The Rev. Percy “Happy” Watkins remembers the day in 1979 when a group of churchgoers decided to fix up an old pool hall at Greene Street and Fourth Avenue in the heart of Spokane’s East Central neighborhood.

The goal was to transform the decrepit little brick building into a place fit for worship.

“Cobwebs … it was awful,” Watkins said. “Some men got together and started renovating. I didn’t think it could be done.”

But they did it, and for 37 years, that building has housed the New Hope Baptist Church, which was founded in a pastor’s home in 1957. Watkins has led the congregation since 1990.

Now, the church is preparing to relocate again.

New Hope is raising money to purchase a bigger building at Argonne Road and Boone Avenue in Spokane Valley – the site of the Valley Landmark Missionary Baptist Church, which is also preparing to relocate. In the meantime, New Hope will hold services at the Bethel AME Church on Newark Avenue.

“We think if we have a more ‘churchy’ location, we’ll generate more ‘churchy’ people,” Watkins said.

New Hope has raised about $140,000 of the $275,000 needed to buy the new building, Watkins said. Organizers are meeting next week to plan fundraising efforts for the remaining portion of the purchase cost.

The church in the Valley has a baptismal font, a wheelchair ramp and plenty more parking spaces – “a lot of things we don’t have at our old church,” Watkins said.

After 37 years of patching walls and plugging leaks in the Greene Street building, he quipped, “We can’t put no more lipstick or perfume on the pig.”

A Portland developer, Stuart Fox, plans to demolish the Greene Street church and build two one-story duplexes on the property. He’ll name them the New Hope Apartments.

“I like the area, and I think there’s some revitalization going on there,” Fox said of the East Central neighborhood. “It’s been down in the dumps for a long time.”

The New Hope Apartments will be geared toward low-income families and will rent for about $600 a month, Fox said.

“Unfortunately, in these areas a lot of landlords don’t mind being slumlords, and we’re trying to change that,” he said. “We really pride ourselves on working with tenants and making sure that repairs are being made.”

By Watkins’ count, there are only 22 black congregations in the Spokane area, which has hundreds of churches. New Hope services typically draw around 50 people, and he hopes those numbers will grow at the new location.

Watkins, who turned 75 on Saturday, said he plans to step down as New Hope’s pastor in the next year or so. He’s ready to hand over the position to his son, James Watkins, who’s currently the assistant pastor.

“I think he’s ready to take over,” said Happy Watkins, smiling.

Asked if he’s grown attached to the old church, Watkins first reflected on the tight-knit East Central neighborhood, which he’s seen evolve over the years.

“Attached to the neighborhood, yes,” he said. “Attached to the building? No.”

Correction: Due to a source’s error, an earlier version of this story listed an incorrect sale price for the Valley Landmark Missionary Baptist Church.