Rick Piper, Cashmere, tries to keep from falling after losing his balance cutting out branches at the parking lot for the old ice rink at the foot of Fifth Street in Wenatchee Tuesday night. The Awaken church is renting the rink and is preparing the parking lot as well as the inside of the building for services. Church members hope to move from their building in north Wenatchee in October.
Rick Piper, Cashmere, tries to keep from falling after losing his balance cutting out branches at the parking lot for the old ice rink at the foot of Fifth Street in Wenatchee Tuesday night. The Awaken church is renting the rink and is preparing the parking lot as well as the inside of the building for services. Church members hope to move from their building in north Wenatchee in October.
WORLD PHOTO/DON SEABROOKWENATCHEE — Ice rink, roller derby rink, soccer stadium, and now church.
The next incarnation of the former Riverfront Park Ice Rink will star God and a congregation rather than athletes and thrill-seeking skaters and sports-watchers, starting this fall.
Awaken Church has signed a lease on the massive building and has begun remodel work to create separate assembly and worship room, classrooms and offices, said associate Pastor Ross Kellogg.
The church was started about three and a half years ago by Kellogg's cousin, Daniel Kellogg, who remains the church's head pastor. It has between 500 and 600 members and now meets in a warehouse on Duncan Road. The nondenominational church is conservative in its theology, Ross Kellogg said.
"It's a place where people who don't usually go to church and never thought they would go to church go to church," he said.
Ross Kellogg said several volunteers, some of them who aren't congregation members, have offered services, materials and discounts to help manage the project, do the remodel work, install heating and air conditioning, provide seating and complete other tasks needed for the renovation.
The church hopes to move in by the end of October.
The former Riverfront Park Ice Arena was home for many years to local figure and recreational skaters and hockey players and leagues.
The city of Wenatchee tore down a second adjacent rink and put the 1.4-acre property and main rink up for sale in 2013 when the regional events center now known as the Town Toyota Center was built. That facility has two year-around ice rinks for public and Wenatchee Wild junior hockey league play.
The Riverfront Park Ice Arena was built by in 1984.
Wenatchee accountant John McQuaig purchased the property in 2013 and has plans to eventually develop it and other property he owns in the area to residential or retail space.
He leased the ice rink to Awaken Church after the Wenatchee Valley Sportsplex opted not to renew its lease. McQuaig also owns the Riverfront Center office building across from the old ice rink.
Rick Steigmeyer: 664-7151
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