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Fortuna planning commission approves permit to bring Seventh-day Adventist Church into conformance, allow medical appointments
Summary
The Fortuna Planning Commission voted April 28 to approve a conditional use permit for the Fortuna Seventh-day Adventist Church at 2301 Ronerville Road to regularize its existing church and community services and allow limited medical appointments; staff found the project exempt from CEQA and the motion passed by roll call.
The Fortuna Planning Commission on April 28 approved a conditional use permit to bring the Fortuna Seventh-day Adventist Church and its associated community services into conformance and to allow the addition of physician care appointments at the church’s site at 2301 Ronerville Road.
Planner Schmidt told commissioners the applicant operates a place of worship and a community service facility that provides educational, nutritional, psychological and family-support programs, as well as a food pantry, clothing closet and crisis shelter. Schmidt said the project would formalize an existing, legally nonconforming use and permit the planned expansion of medical services to serve community clients. “The city does support this conditional use permit,” Schmidt said during the presentation.
Schmidt described the site as two parcels totaling roughly 75,000 square feet, with a church building of about 15,000 square feet and a community services building of about 11,000 square feet; access is via Ronerville Road with circulation out to Valley View Drive, and staff said there is ample on-site parking. The property is zoned R-1 (single-family residential) and staff concluded the church and community services are compatible with the Fortuna general plan’s residential-low designation as a quasi-public use, provided required findings are met.
As part of environmental review, staff recommended the commission find the project exempt from the California Environmental Quality Act under the common-sense and Class 1 exemptions, stating there was no physical expansion and only a negligible increase in intensity from the addition of medical appointments. Staff also said public notice was published in the North Coast Journal on April 16 and that property owner notices were mailed on April 15, 2026.
During the public hearing, Rhonda Lewis — who identified herself as the organization’s executive director and said she has served in that role since March 1, 1994 — offered to answer questions and described day-to-day operations as continuing "business as usual." Commissioners asked whether the site had ever been the subject of a previous conditional use permit; Schmidt replied the church had long operated as a legal nonconforming use and that the CUP is required for the expansion.
A commissioner moved to approve Resolution P-2026-3147, which approves the conditional use permit for assessor parcel numbers referenced in staff materials and finds the project exempt from CEQA; another commissioner seconded the motion. The commission then conducted a roll-call vote on the resolution; all present commissioners voted yes and the resolution carried.
Next steps noted by staff included finalizing permit conditions and administrative processing of the resolution. The commission did not record any abstentions or dissenting votes on the matter.
