Guru Gobind Singh Sikh Center, Inc. (the “Temple”), on June 29, 2016 in the Eastern District of New York, sued the Town of Oyster Bay, New York, the Town Board, and several Town Officials (together, the “Defendants”) after the Defendants halted the Temple’s construction of a house of worship, known as a gurdwara. The complaint is available here.

According to the complaint, the Temple had received site plan approval in February, 2014 to construct a new gurdwara on property it used for worship since 1987, as well as three adjoining parcels. On March 7, 2014, the Temple obtained a building permit to construct the new gurdwara, and in September it began demolition of its prior gurdwara.

Neighbors started complaining when construction of the new gurdwara began. Then, on July 2, 2015, the Town issued a stop work order, which the complaint alleges was a direct response to these complaints. After the stop work order, the Temple held various meetings with the Town’s Commissioner of Planning and Development, Frederick Ippolito. After several revisions to the site plan addressing parking, Ippolito notified the Temple, on January 21, 2016 that the stop work order was lifted.

On February 2, 2016, the Town Board adopted Resolution No. 65-2016 (the “Resolution”), which “suspended” the site plan approval issued to the Temple. The Resolution stated that the prior approval was contingent on the purchase of a property across the street from the Temple’s property, although the Temple contests that the contingency exists. The Town also told the Temple that it would need to conduct an environmental review under the State Environmental Quality Review Act (“SEQRA”). The Temple says the review is unnecessary, and that since 82% of the gurdwara has already been constructed, SEQRA review would impose an undue burden and delay on the Temple and its members, who, the Temple asserts, are now without an adequate place of worship.

The complaint includes three RLUIPA counts (Substantial Burden, Nondiscrimination and Equal Terms), and causes of action under the First Amendment, Fourteenth Amendment, and the New York State Constitution.

Whether requiring SEQRA review imposes a substantial burden is an issue worth following. In Fortress Bible Church v. Feiner (2d. Cir 2011), the Second Circuit found that although SEQRA is not a “land use regulation” as defined by RLUIPA, SEQRA’s application might still trigger RLUIPA’s protections in some situations. In Fortress Bible, the court found that the Town of Greenburgh, New York had substantially burdened Fortress Bible’s religious exercise by acting in bad faith and using the SEQRA review process as a way to block the church’s development proposal. SEQRA review was considered in the substantial burden analysis because “the Town used the SEQRA review process as its vehicle for determining the zoning issues related to the Church’s land use proposal… [and] holding that RLUIPA is inapplicable to what amounts to zoning actions under statutorily mandated environmental review, such as SEQRA, would allow municipalities to insulate zoning decisions from claims of violations under RLUIPA.” We posted about the SEQRA issue in Fortress Bible here and about the final settlement in the case here.

 

Khanda, original photo by Jasleen Kaur, some rights reserved.

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.

Read more about Evan Seeman
Show more Show less
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.

Show more Show less
Related Posts
 Proposed Law in Woodbury, New York Would Require Permits for Eruvin
December 20, 2018
Cows 2
CAFO Stinks, but Not a Substantial Burden
January 31, 2018
Mule Deer in Deschutes County, Oregon.
To Protect Wildlife, or Religious Freedom?
December 26, 2017