In an important decision for local governments, the Illinois Appellate Court on March 6, 2015 issued its decision in Joan Dachs Bais Yaakov Elementary School (“JDBY”) v. City of Evanston. The decision, particularly the Appellate Court’s assessment of comparators and its willingness to look past some boorish comments by a local official, may prove damaging to religious use applicants asserting claims under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act’s (RLUIPA) equal terms provision.

The case involves a proposed Jewish elementary school by plaintiff JDBY on property zoned for industrial use in the City of Evanston.  After the City denied its application to rezone the subject property, JDBY alleged the City treated it on less than equal terms with four others uses that had obtained rezoning approval from the City (townhomes, work-live condos, a gas station, and a shopping center).  While the Appellate Court assumed without deciding that these other uses were “assemblies,” it nonetheless concluded that they could not be deemed valid comparators because those other uses are taxable uses that continue to pay property taxes while the proposed school use would not be required to pay taxes.

Municipalities that treat religious uses unequally because of their tax exempt status often end up on the losing side of a RLUIPA case.  See, for example, Fortress Bible Church v. Feiner, 694 F.3d 208, 214 (2d Cir. 2012).  The concept that tax-paying uses may not be fair comparators is remarkable and in many instances will prove damaging to religious applicants.

By its very nature, an as-applied equal terms claim requires that a religious use be compared with a secular use.  In most municipalities, religious uses are exempt from real property taxes while most secular uses are not.  It appears that the Appellate Court’s property tax distinction now gives local governments a new shield to defend against some RLUIPA claims.

The Appellate Court also rejected JDBY’s nondiscrimination claim.  Such claims are similar to equal terms claims in that they may be supported by religious (as opposed to secular) comparators being treated better than the complaining plaintiff.  While establishing a comparator is not necessary to prevail on a nondiscrimination claim, evidence of discriminatory intent is a must.  In this case, JDBY pointed to an email from the City’s zoning administrator to an alderwoman regarding the proposed Jewish school as evidence of discriminatory intent:

Even though I am unconvinced by this rather un-kosher logic, the zoning ordinance makes it clear that it is the Council that determines a unique use, on recommendation from the Plan Commission. As Zoning Administrator, I am limited to reviewing the application for completeness and assessing if the applicant has standing.  I have been advised by the Law Department to accept a complete application (still waiting for this), and schedule it for a public hearing. We will, of course, submit a Staff report regarding the merits of the application versus the requirements and standards of the Zoning [Ordinance] (parting the Red Sea would be easier, I would say right now), but it looks like it will be up to you and your colleagues to make the determination.  (emphasis added).

However, even though the Appellate Court noted that the zoning administrator’s comments were offensive and inappropriate, it did not find them determinative because other agency members were ultimately responsible for deciding the rezoning application, and each testified that they were not influenced by the email.

Lastly, the Appellate Court was not persuaded by JDBY’s claim that Vineyard Christian Fellowship of Evanston, which had obtained a special permit to use property in the immediate vicinity of the proposed Jewish school as a church, was a valid comparator.  The Court reasoned that the distinction between the grant of special permit for the church use and the rezoning application for the proposed Jewish school were too dissimilar and necessitated rejection of any claim that the church was a valid comparator.

The trial court decision in this matter, affirmed by the Appellate Court, is available here.

Print:
Email this postTweet this postLike this postShare this post on LinkedIn
Photo of Evan Seeman Evan Seeman

Evan J. Seeman is a lawyer in Robinson+Cole’s Hartford office and focuses his practice on land use, real estate, environmental, and regulatory matters, representing local governments, developers and advocacy groups. He has spoken and written about RLUIPA, and was a lead author of…

Evan J. Seeman is a lawyer in Robinson+Cole’s Hartford office and focuses his practice on land use, real estate, environmental, and regulatory matters, representing local governments, developers and advocacy groups. He has spoken and written about RLUIPA, and was a lead author of an amicus curiae brief at the petition stage before the United States Supreme Court in a RLUIPA case entitled City of San Leandro v. International Church of the Foursquare Gospel.

Evan serves as the Secretary/Treasurer of the APA’s Planning & Law Division. He also serves as the Chair of the Planning & Zoning Section of the Connecticut Bar Association’s Young Lawyers Section, and is the former Co-Chair of its Municipal Law Section. He has been named to the Connecticut Super Lawyers® list as a Rising Star in the area of Land Use Law for 2013 and 2014. He received his B.A. in political science and Russian studies (with honors) from Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, where he was selected as the President’s Fellow in the Department of Modern Languages and Literature. Evan received his Juris Doctor at the University of Connecticut School of Law, where he served on the Connecticut Law Review. While in law school, he interned with the Connecticut Office of the Attorney General in the environmental department, and served as a judicial intern for the judges of the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Court. Following law school, Evan clerked for the Honorable F. Herbert Gruendel of the Connecticut Appellate Court.

Photo of Dwight Merriam Dwight Merriam

Dwight H. Merriam founded Robinson+Cole’s Land Use Group in 1978. He represents land owners, developers, governments and individuals in land use matters, with a focus on defending governments in RLUIPA cases. Dwight is a Fellow and Past President of the American Institute of…

Dwight H. Merriam founded Robinson+Cole’s Land Use Group in 1978. He represents land owners, developers, governments and individuals in land use matters, with a focus on defending governments in RLUIPA cases. Dwight is a Fellow and Past President of the American Institute of Certified Planners, a former Director of the American Planning Association (APA), a former chair of APA’s Planning and Law Division, Immediate Past Chair of the American Bar Association’s Section of State and Local Government Law, Chair of the Institute of Local Government Studies at the Center for American and International Law, a Fellow of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation, a member of the Rocky Mountain Land Use Institute National Advisory Board, a Fellow of the Connecticut Bar Foundation, a Counselor of Real Estate, a member of the Anglo-American Real Property Institute, and a Fellow of the American College of Real Estate Lawyers.

He teaches land use law at the University of Connecticut School of Law and at Vermont Law School and has published over 200 articles and eight books, including Inclusionary Zoning Moves Downtown, The Takings Issue, The Complete Guide to Zoning, and Eminent Domain Use and Abuse: Kelo in Context. He is the senior co-author of the leading casebook on land use law, Planning and Control of Land Development (Eighth Edition). Dwight has written and spoken widely on how to avoid RLUIPA claims and how to successfully defend against them in court. He is currently writing a book on the subject, RLUIPA DEFENSE, for the American Bar Association.

Dwight has been named to the Connecticut Super Lawyers® list in the area of Land Use Law since 2006, is one of the Top 50 Connecticut Super Lawyers in Connecticut, and is one of the Top 100 New England Super Lawyers (Super Lawyers is a registered trademark of Key Professional Media, Inc.). He received his B.A. (cum laude) from the University of Massachusetts, his Masters of Regional Planning from the University of North Carolina, where he was the graduation speaker in 2011, and his J.D. from Yale. He is a featured speaker at many land use seminars, and presents monthly audio land use seminars for the International Municipal Lawyers Association. Dwight has been cited in the national press from The New York Times to People magazine and has appeared on NBC’s The Today Show, MSNBC and public television.

Dwight also had a career in the Navy, serving for three tours in Vietnam aboard ship, then returning to be the Senior Advisor of the Naval ROTC Unit at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill where he taught Defense Administration and Military Management as an Assistant Professor in the undergraduate and graduate curriculum in Defense Administration and Military Management. He left active duty after seven years to attend law school, but continued on for 24 more years as a reserve Surface Warfare Officer with two major commands, including that of the reserve commanding officer of the Naval Undersea Warfare Center. He retired as a Captain in 2009 after 31 years of service.