“To err is human; to forgive, divine.”  An Essay on Criticism, Part II (1711) by Alexander Pope (1688-1744). We all make mistakes. And fortunately, many of our transgressions are forgiven.  Sometimes, however, the Rule of Law will not permit certain behavior to be disregarded.  Such may prove to be the case in the central Arkansas city of Beebe (pop. 5,300), where a Pagan group is trying to obtain zoning approval to open a church.  When Bertram and Felicia Dahl, High Priest and Priestess of Seekers Temple, sought the assistance of a local alderman to help them use their home as a pagan temple, he refused.  Reportedly, this alderman stated in public that he refused to help because “that man’s God isn’t my God.”

The Dahls opened Seekers Temple in 2008 in El Paso, Arkansas.  They moved to Beebe in 2014 and sought to open a church from their home.  The Dahls claim that Beebe Mayor Mike Robertson was initially supportive of their efforts to relocate their church, but that all changed when Mayor Robertson learned that the Dahls were Pagans – not Christians.  In 2010, Mayor Robertson publicly stated that “government has allowed non-believers far too many liberties taking God out of our daily lives.”

The city issued a cease and desist order against the Dahls, even though their church was not yet operational.  The city attorney stated in an interview that places of worship were permitted in the subject zoning district (R-2) only by special permit or conditional permit, and the Dahls had not applied for either.  When the Dahls attempted to obtain an application, they claim they were refused:

We had been turned down without even applying, but we thought we would officially apply anyway.  The secretary called the mayor and said on the phone “He is standing right here in front of me.”  And after a few moments of listening to him, she hung up and told me the mayor said “We will not be granting any permit of any kind to you.”  We were then informed (though they would not put it in writing) that we could not have any application, that there would be no permit of any kind for us and that we could not speak with the city attorney as previously promised.  We were convinced by this that we had a clear case of religious persecution.

The Dahls also met with the mayor to try to resolve what they believed was a misunderstanding, and recount this meeting:

As he had encouraged us with our church before, we felt there must be some misunderstanding.  During this meeting, the mayor told us we would not be opening a Pagan anything in his town.  When we told him we wanted to talk to the town counsel [sic] about this, he told us that if we showed our face at the town meeting, we would not be on the docket and we would not be heard.  We told the mayor that this seemed like religious persecution and he responded with “I don’t care, it’s not going to happen.”

But the Dahls were heard at the July 23 city council meeting, and their request for relief was denied on the ground that they are prohibited by zoning from operating a church on the same property they live.  High Priest Dahl, however, claims that 46 other properties in Beebe are combination places of worship/residence uses.  During the meeting, Mayor Robertson stated “There have been allegations that this is a civil rights issue.  This is no more than a zoning issue.”

Will this “zoning issue” turn into a civil rights issue, and more specifically, a RLUIPA claim?  For clips of the meeting, click here and here.  To read the Dahls’ personal account of these events, click here.

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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.