Noor Mosque in Hilliard aims to connect with neighbors through newly acquired building
One of the largest mosques in Greater Columbus has purchased a massive office building in Hilliard that it plans to use as a community space for Muslims and non-Muslims alike.
Possibilities for the Noor Islamic Cultural Center’s new acquisition at 5550 Britton Parkway include a cafe, a day care, an arcade for kids, a salon, STEM lab and an events venue, according to lay leaders. The building, which has more than 220,000 square feet of floor space, could house nonprofits and for-profit businesses alike, according to Fadi Suleiman, a Palestinian American mosque member and real estate agent who helped broker the deal.
Ronney Abaza, the mosque’s board chairperson, said he hopes the building can be a bridge between the Muslim community and Greater Columbus.
“There's been a rise in Islamophobia and a lot of negative sentiment against Islam and Muslims,” said Abaza, a urologist who was born and raised in Toledo. “Part of what we hope to achieve as Ohioans, as Americans (and) as Muslims, is to use this facility as a way to really create connections with our fellow Hilliard neighbors and Columbus at large.”
The new building, which BMW Financial occupied until late 2022, is just a few blocks away from Noor’s main campus, 5001 Wilcox Road. Suleiman said the new building will not be used for worship services but could be used for collaborations with local schools, governments and other organizations.
“If someone in Hilliard school district … would like to, for example, do a STEM lab for students, there's plenty of space that we can do it. If someone in City Hall has an idea that they want to do a technology incubator, there’s plenty of space that we can do this,” Suleiman said.
The new building includes a 1,200-space parking lot on nearly 15 acres of land.
Documents from the Franklin County Recorder show the mosque took over the $28.9 million mortgage from the previous owner, M-BM LLC, for token a sale price of $1 on Feb. 21. Abaza said the acquisition was funded by members of the community who wish to remain anonymous.
Mosque membership growing rapidly
The purchase of the new building comes as the Muslim community in central Ohio continues to grow, according to Noor’s Interfaith Director Imran Malik.
The mosque, which opened in 2005, serves 5,000 to 6,000 people, though prayer attendance on any given day is lower than that. Attendance grew by about 3% per year from 2012-2016, accelerating to around 5% or 6% annually since COVID-19, Malik said.
The rapid growth has led Noor to open satellite campuses for worship in other Columbus suburbs like New Albany and Plain City in recent years.
Noor is the third-largest mosque in central Ohio, after Abubakar Asiddiq Islamic Center on Columbus’ West Side and Ibnu Taymiyah Masjid and Islamic Center in North Linden, Malik said. While those other mosques primarily cater to the Somali community, Malik said Noor has a diverse makeup with over 40 ethnicities represented — including Muslims from the Middle East, East Africa, China, India, Pakistan and Latin America.
Muslim community center to be YMCA-like
Suleiman said the new facility can be put to multiple purposes, much like a YMCA.
Abaza said that in addition to ideas from mosque members, they welcome suggestions from the public about how to use the space.
“We're open minded and really open to any suggestions; we'd love to hear from people who have ideas for how we can best use the space to serve the community,” he said. “Everything is on the table.”
Peter Gill covers immigration, New American communities and religion for the Dispatch in partnership with Report for America. You can support work like his with a tax-deductible donation to Report for America at: bit.ly/3fNsGaZ.
pgill@dispatch.com
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Noor Mosque aims to build bridges with newly acquired building
