Fed. Dist. Court of MD Holds County Violated RLUIPA in Denying Church’s Application for a Category Change in Water and Sewer Plan

This post was authored by Matthew Loescher, Esq.

Victory Temple is a religious congregation of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (“RCCG”): an evangelical church and was founded in Nigeria in 1952. Victory Temple filed this lawsuit against Prince George’s County, Maryland alleging that the County’s denial of Victory Temple’s application for an amendment to the Prince George’s County Water and Sewer Plan violated the substantial burden provision of the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000 (“RLUIPA”).

The court first noted that the County’s distinction between the administrative and legislative amendment processes was unavailing. Specifically, according to the Water and Sewer Plan, the administrative process applied “when changes are proposed from Category 4 to Category 3” and the legislative process applied “when changes are proposed from Category 6 or 5 to Category 4.” Here, two other property owners, Cresthill Baptist Church and Trinity Lutheran Church, applied for an amendment during the December 2018 cycle of amendments. These two property owners each requested and received a category change from Category 5 to Category 3.

The record also indicated that Victory Temple had a reasonable expectation that it could use the Mount Oak Road property to build a church. The County’s denial of Victory Temple’s application for a water and sewer category change substantially burdened Victory Temple because Victory Temple could not proceed with its development plans while the property remained in Category 5.

The County further argued that approving Victory Temple’s category change request would make the existing traffic issues even worse. The court determined that Victory Temple did not cause the current traffic issues and there was no reliable evidence that the activities of the church would exacerbate those issues. Moreover, the County’s denial of Victory Temple’s application was not the least restrictive means of ameliorating them. As such, the court held that the County violated RLUIPA in denying Victory Temple’s application for a category change from W5 and S5 to W4 and S4.

The Redeemed Christian Church of God (Victory Temple) Bowie, Maryland v Prince George’s County, Maryland, 2020 WL 5407808 (D. MD 9/9/2020)