OTTAWA HILLS, Ohio — The embattled pastor of an Ottawa Hills church that closed its pre-school earlier in the Spring, upsetting hundreds of parents, is stepping down.
Multiple people in attendance at a service on Saturday evening say Senior Pastor Stephen Swisher announced his intention to stay on for two more weekends before voluntarily resigning his position.
The church's pre-school shut down in early March - leading to an online petition to fire Swisher that reached nearly one-thousand signatures.
Christina Gondol, a parishioner at the church and parent of a child in the church’s pre-school, says that she and other parents are happy that Swisher is stepping down but were hoping it would have happened sooner.
“It’s good to have him gone, but there’s no reason that he should be doing services for the next two weeks,” Gondol said.
The Epworth Preschool closed in March shortly after the school’s former director said she was fired for questioning why $47,000 was transferred from the school’s preschool budget.
Days later, the church closed the doors of the pre-school for the remainder of the year citing a lack of teachers, something that parents disputed.
The church also denied any financial impropriety and cited an audit by a Maumee accounting firm.
Since that time, parents, upset at the school’s closure and the way it was handled have banded together to compile their complaints on a private-Facebook group and shared their complaints with the church’s bishop to review.
WTOL 11 reached out to Swisher for comment but have yet to hear back.
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