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Sunday, January 3, 2010

Palm Beach County School District's profitable rental policy put to the test


Palm Beach County School District's profitable rental policy put to the test:

"There's life after the last bell: On a recent Sunday, Oklahoma-based LifeChurch.tv's 9:30 a.m. service drew enough parishioners to fill the west side of Palm Beach Central High School's parking lot. Space rented from the high school may run five figures, but the school's state-of-the-art auditorium is a good fit with LifeChurch's JumboTron-like broadcast sermons and live music.

And when LifeChurch is shutting down its Sunday services and pulling its 26-foot trailer out of the Wellington school's parking lot, the Tabernacle Pentecost congregation's truck is pulling in.

'It can get interesting,' LifeChurch campus pastor Larry Mayer said of the back-to-back ministries.

That's not the half of it.

Soul line dancing. A poetry slam. Pre-kindergarten graduation. A Sweet Sixteen party, wedding reception, family reunion: Organizations ranging from tutoring franchises to the How Ya Livin ministry are leasing portables, fields and auditoriums, pouring millions of dollars into school district coffers — $3.6 million in the 2008-09 school year alone."