An early-morning fire destroyed the Guru Ram Das Sikh Community temple in east Vancouver.
The fire sparked at the temple at 13400 N.E. 20th St. just before 2:30 a.m., according to emergency dispatch logs.
The Guru Ram Das Sikh Community bought the former Landover Athletic Club building after the club went out of business in 2007. The building is 17,000 square feet on 2.5 acres in a woodsy neighborhood near Northeast 18th Street.
Vancouver Fire Dept. spokesman Capt. Kevin Murray said the fire was called in by neighbors at 2:25 a.m. Firefighters arrived at 2:32 a.m. and found a conflagration. They set up a defensive perimeter of hoses and kept the fire from spreading.
Two men, believed to be construction contractors, were staying in the building. They were awakened by the fire and escaped without injury, Murray said.
The congregation, the largest Sikh group in the Portland metro area with about 200 member families, was raising money to remodel the club for its temple. Work was not complete.
The community currently meets at a smaller site on O Street in west Vancouver. In August, the O Street site was the scene of an interfaith vigil after a gunman opened fire at a Sikh temple in Wisconsin.
The community was planning to move into the new location in December, member Gurjit Singh said.
Sarabjeet Teja and other community members said they heard on the fire on the morning news.
"It was devastating," Teja said. 'We've been working on this the last four years."
Most recently the group finished raising funds to finish the building, which he said was envisioned to be a community gathering center, for the December opening.
Once the fire is doused, the investigation into its cause can begin. The FBI and U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms were on the scene and will investigate the fire along with the city fire marshal.
Murray said that it is customary for federal investigators to respond to the scene of any fire involving a place of worship.
Sikhs around the United States say they have been targets since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Though not Muslims -- their religious traditions originated in present-day Pakistan -- Sikh men wear turbans, causing some people to make incorrect assumptions.
Local Sikhs say they have been the targets of occasional minor harassment since the O Street temple opened in 2001.
The proposal to relocate the temple to the former athletic club was opposed by neighbors, who cited traffic and, ironically, insufficient fire hydrants and the lack of fire sprinklers in the building. In 2009, a hearings examiner ruled in favor of the Sikh congregation's proposal and the city council upheld the hearings examiner's ruling.
Copyright 2012 - The Columbian, Vancouver, Wash.
McClatchy-Tribune News Service
