Saugus church receiving makeover

SAUGUS – The First Baptist Church of Boston on Main Street in Saugus is getting a facelift.The church, also known as the Primer Iglesia Bautista de Boston, has been undergoing renovation work for the past several weeks. Workers have been renovating the church steeple from the ground up.Church administrator Hector Severino said he hopes to be able to redo the rest of the church in time.?The steeple is being remodeled because the wood is corroded,” said Severino. “So we?re removing all the wood outside. It will definitely look better, but our main concern is the wood.”The steeple is now partially covered in half inch plywood as a crew from IG Construction works its way up.?We?re covering the steeple from the bottom to the top,” general contractor Ibrahim Geha said. “Some of the wood is bad, some has rotted through the years. We?ve taken a lot of the wood out and whatever we can save we covered. It?s going to look nice.”The next step will be to insulate the exterior of the steeple and then cover it in white vinyl siding.The Primer Iglesia Bautista de Boston took over what had been the First Parish Unitarian Universalist Church in September 2007.The church has a congregation of around 150 people representing all different Latin countries and Severino said they come from as far as Brockton to attend services.The church has remained open during construction, but services are only held on Sundays so there?s no interference. Geha said there have been some minor delays, but he expects work to be finished in two weeks.?The weather is not helping,” said Geha. “Every time there?s a thunderstorm we can?t go up. It?s like 90-feet high up there. It?s scary.”The church itself was built in 1860, and after a fire destroyed much of the structure in 1941, it was rebuilt and rededicated in 1942. Geha said he found evidence of that fire when they first started work.?It looked like there was a fire somewhere inside the steeple and the roof,” said Geha. “So we took all the old shingles out and put plywood over it and then we shingled it back.”The current project is costing the church around $70,000, which was raised from tithes, or donations from church members. But redoing the siding of the church will cost an additional $60,000, money Severino said the church doesn?t have right now.?We can?t afford to do the siding right now,” said Severino. “Our main concern is the steeple. We will have to do something because we want the church to be as beautiful as possible.”