The following is excerpted from the U.S. DOJ’s Religious Freedom in Focus Newsletter (October 2011)
On October 27, the Civil Rights Division closed its investigation of Schodack, New York under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) after the town agreed to allow a church to move into space it had rented and amended its zoning code to treat religious assemblies equally with nonreligious assemblies. The Civil Rights Division had opened an investigation in November 2010, after receiving a complaint that the town had told the Immanuel Church that it had to obtain a variance to rent space in a commercial zone where nonreligious assemblies were permitted as of right, and then denied the church’s variance request.
Immanuel Church is a small Christian church with less than 80 members. In late 2009, the church began a search for property to rent in the Town of Schodack for Sunday worship, offices, and religious education classes. The church entered into a lease for office space in a building in a commercial district that previously had been used as a training center. At the time, Schodack’s zoning ordinance only allowed churches in three residential districts, and then only with a special use permit. Churches were barred from commercial districts, although non-religious assemblies such as membership clubs and lodges, funeral homes, libraries, and museums could locate as a matter of right in those districts. Certain other nonreligious assemblies, including recreational facilities, indoor and outdoor amusement businesses, civic centers, and theaters, could locate in a commercial zone with a special use permit.
The Civil Rights Division opened an investigation to determine whether the city’s actions were in violation of Section 2(b)(1) of RLUIPA, which provides that “no government shall impose or implement a land use regulation in a manner that treats a religious assembly or institution on less than equal terms with a nonreligious assembly or institution.”
In response to the investigation, the town granted the Immanuel Church a five-year special use permit to rent the space. The town also revised its zoning ordinance on August 25, 2011. It now treats religious assemblies equally with membership clubs and lodges, permitting them as of right or with a special use permit in the vast majority of zoning districts.
