Share this:

Gordon owned an office building zoned in the Special Commercial District (SC), which allowed for an F-1 office use (“primarily office functions in nature”). The Glenside Center signed a lease with Gordon for a portion of his building, intending to use the premises for holding group meetings for members of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), Narcotics Anonymous (NA), and Debtors Anonymous (DA). The lease agreement provided that the lessee “shall use and occupy the premises for group meetings. The premises shall be used for no other purpose. Lessor represents that the premises may lawfully be used for such purpose.” The evidence was that Glendale held 38 such meetings a week. Neighbors complained that people attending the meetings were causing traffic and parking problems, noise problems, leaving garbage in the area, and loitered late into the evening hours.  Subsequently, the Township’s Director of Planning and Code Enforcement notified Glenside that its use of the premises was not permitted within the SC zoning district. Glenside appealed that determination to the Zoning Board, arguing that it was using the building for office purposes because, in addition to the meetings, the building served as Glenside’s administrative offices, from which bills were paid and meetings were held concerning the governance of Glenside.  In the alternative, it stated that it was seeking a use variance from the Board. Lastly, it took the position that the Board had to consider the matter pursuant to the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA): “While AA or its related organizations do not claim to be an established religion, the constituent groups can and have been viewed as engaging in an exercise of religion.

 

RLUIPA broadly defines religious exercise to include ‘any exercise of religion, whether or not compelled by, or central to, a system of religious beliefs.’” However, Glenside was not a religious organization; none of the meetings were led by a minister, priest, rabbi or other religious/spiritual leader; and the materials relating to the AA program specified that AA was not a religious organization. In fact, the president of Glenside testified that AA, NA, and DA had no religious affiliation at all, although a group member indicated that the meetings had a spiritual component, in that members were encouraged to seek contact with a higher power.  Further, the evidence was that there was no onsite staff (apart from a cleaning person) or any computers, typewriters, or filing cabinets; any office functions were few and purely incidental to the group meeting use.

 

The Board determined that the use of the office building was an “E-2 Community Center Use” and not an “F-1 Office Use,” and declined to grant a variance. Regarding the RLUIPA claim (that no government could impose or implement a land use regulation in a manner that imposed a substantial burden on the religious exercise of a person, including a religious assembly or institution, unless the government demonstrated that the imposition of the burden on that person was in furtherance of a compelling government interest), the Board found that Glenside’s activities were not a free exercise of religion, the regulations at issue did not impose a “substantial burden” on any of the activities by Glenside, and that the ordinance was not a substantial burden on Glenside’s religious exercise because not permitting a community center and group meeting center in the SC zoning district did not constitute a violation of Glenside’s right of free exercise of religion in violation of  RLUIPA. Glenside appealed to the trial court, which affirmed the Board. There was no violation of RLUIPA because Glenside failed to establish that its use of the office building constituted an exercise of religion. Glenside filed a further appeal, and the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania dismissed the appeal.

 

The Board’s finding that Glenside did not use the leased space “primarily” for office functions was amply supported by evidence of record. Thus, its group meeting use was not a use permitted by the applicable zoning.  The restriction was not a violation of RLUIPA, as Glenside presented no binding authority for its proposition that an AA meeting was a religious exercise as that term was used in RLUIPA: The “primary purpose of the group meetings, whether they be for AA, NA or DA, [was] to support individuals who [were] recovering from alcohol, drug, gambling and debtor addictions, not to advance religion.”

 

Glenside Center, Inc. v. Abington Township Zoning Hearing Board, Abington Township and Easton Road Realty, 2009 WL 669930 (Pa. Comm. Ct. 3/17/2009)

 

The opinion can be accessed at: http://www.aopc.org/OpPosting/Cwealth/out/886CD08_3-17-09.pdf

 

This abstract appears in the IMLA News 3/25/2009.  See: www.imla.org and visit their blog at http://imlablog.wordpress.com/category/land-use

 

Special thanks to Dwight Merriam of Robinson & Cole for bring this case to our attention.