Church of Our Savior v. City of Jacksonville Beach

69 F.Supp.3d 1299

CHURCH OF OUR SAVIOR, formerly known as Resurrection Anglican Church, Inc., a Florida Nonprofit Corporation, Plaintiff

v.The CITY OF JACKSONVILLE BEACH, a Florida Municipal Corporation, Defendant.

Case No. 3:13–cv–1346–J–32JBT.

United States District Court, M.D. Florida, Jacksonville Division.

Signed Nov. 25, 2014.

Charles L. Stambaugh, Stambaugh & Associates, PA, Jacksonville, FL, Daniel P. Dalton, Dalton & Tomich, PLC, Katharine Elizabeth Brink, Dalton & Tomich, PLC, Detroit, MI, for Plaintiff.

Dale A. Scott, Michael J. Roper, Bell & Roper, PA, Orlando, FL, for Defendant.

FINDINGS OF FACT AND CONCLUSIONS OF LAW

TIMOTHY J. CORRIGAN, District Judge.

This dispute lies at the intersection of a church's right to practice its religion and a local government's power to regulate land use. Plaintiff Church of Our Savior challenges Defendant City of Jacksonville Beach's denial of the Church's request for a conditional use permit to build a church on property zoned residential. This case is brought under three provisions of the federal Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA), 42 U.S.C. § 2000cc.

At the Church's request and with good cause, the Court expedited the case for trial before the Court on September 17 and 18, 2014.¹ (Docs. 99, 100.) Following trial, the parties submitted proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law. (Docs. 107, 110.) The Court heard final argument on November 10, 2014. (Doc. 115.) The case is now ready for decision. Fed.R.Civ.P. 52(a).²

I. FACTS

A. The Church of Our Savior

The Church of Our Savior began its existence in 2006 as Resurrection Anglican Church, which itself formed from a Bible study at St. Paul's by-the-Sea Episcopal Church in Jacksonville Beach, Florida.

(Trial Tr. vol. 1, 19, Sept. 17, 2014, Doc. 104.) In 2013, Resurrection Anglican Church came together with Calvary Anglican Church to form one congregation known as the Church of Our Savior. (Doc. 104 at 19–21; Trial Tr. vol. 2, 11–12, Sept. 18, 2014, Doc. 105.) The Church is the only Anglican church in Jacksonville Beach and the surrounding seaside communities of Atlantic Beach, Neptune Beach, and Ponte Vedra Beach. (Doc. 104 at 35.)

Since its founding, the Church has worshipped at six separate facilities. (Id. at 19–20.) The Church currently holds services at the Beaches Museum Chapel in Jacksonville Beach. (Id. at 20, 23.) The Beaches Museum Chapel is a historic chapel owned by the Beaches Area Historical Society. (Id. at 24; see Pl.'s Ex. 5.) After unsuccessfully attempting to reach a longer term agreement with the Historical Society in 2011 and having to use a different location, the Church eventually signed a three-month lease for the Chapel. (Doc. 104 at 25–27; Pl.'s Exs. 4–6.) The lease has no automatic renewal provision. It allows the Church to use the Chapel for worship and two adjacent buildings for nursery and children's Sunday school for four hours on Sunday mornings and gives the Church priority for major religious holidays, like Ash Wednesday, Easter week, and Christmas Eve. (Pl.'s Ex. 6; see Doc. 104 at 27–28.) The Chapel may also be rented for other church events not traditionally performed on Sundays, like weddings, baptisms, and Bible studies, but the Church first needs to check with the Historical Society to make sure it is available (Doc. 104 at 28–29; Pl.'s Ex. 6.) Presently, no other church regularly uses the Chapel. (Doc. 104 at 51.)

The Church views the Chapel building as less than ideal due to its limited storage space and signage and its maximum capacity of 140 people. (Doc. 104 at 29–31; Doc. 105 at 17; Pl.'s Ex. 5.) The Church suggests the comfortable capacity of the Chapel is actually no more than 100 people. (Doc. 105 at 51–52.) On top of that, Church experience suggests that occupying more than 80% of a facility's capacity during services inhibits further membership growth. (Id. at 15.) With an average Sunday attendance of approximately 100 people, the Church moved to two Sunday services in 2013. (Id. at 14–15, 51; Pl.'s Ex. 3.³ ) The Church contends without dispute that these time and space limitations constrain its ability to grow and to fully exercise its religion by performing its sacraments and worshipping together in one service. (Doc. 105 at 15–16; see Doc. 104 at 31–32.)

B. The Property

Even before it became the Church of Our Savior, the Church had hoped to own its building on its own property. (Doc. 104 at 33–34.) The Church identified three main search criteria drawn from circumstances and its religious beliefs and traditions: affordability, visibility (or “identifiability”), and accessibility. (Doc. 104 at 34–36; Doc. 105 at 22–24.) On affordability—the “number one” criteria—the Church's budget was $300,000 to $500,000, though it would need seller financing for that amount. (Doc. 104 at 34, 36.) As to visibility, the Church wanted an “attractive” church on a main thoroughfare that a passerby would recognize as a church. (Id. at 37–38, 109–10). The Church was open to refurbishing a building, as well as building new. (Doc. 105 at 52.) As for accessibility, the building itself needed to be physically accessible, but also centrally located in the Jacksonville Beach, Neptune Beach, Atlantic Beach, and Ponte Vedra Beach area, and on the east side of the intracoastal waterway. (Doc. 104 at 88–89; Doc. 105 at 24–25, 43–44.) The Church did not hire a professional real estate broker, but relied on one of its leaders, a retired real estate agent, and the rest of its members to be on the lookout for suitable property. (Doc. 104 at 38–40; Doc. 105 at 22–23.)

During this informal but persistent search, the Church's pastor, Reverend David Ball, identified vacant land for sale along Beach Boulevard (the “Property”), just east of the intracoastal waterway, that might meet the Church's three criteria. (Doc. 104 at 42–43; Doc. 105 at 30–31.) As depicted on the satellite image below, the Property actually consists of three parcels currently owned by two different owners⁴ and separated by a City-owned sewer lift station. (Doc. 105 at 130–31; Pl.'s Exs. 7, 11.)

(Def.'s Ex. 32.⁵ ) The total acreage of the Property is unclear in the record, with some support for a total of 1.34 acres, 1.62 acres, or 1.7 acres. (Pl.'s Ex. 10; Pl.'s Ex. 11 at 6; Pl.'s Ex. 18 at 2.) To the north of the Property is Beach Boulevard, a six-lane highway with commercial property on its north side. (Doc. 104 at 46.) The Property is accessed from the north via a frontage road along Beach Boulevard. (Doc. 105 at 72–73.) Immediately to the east of the Property is a drainage ditch and a grass and gravel overflow parking lot for Adventure Landing amusement park, which is on the other side of the parking lot and is the nearest structure to the east of the Property.⁶ (Doc. 104 at 46–47.) To the west and south of the Property is a small neighborhood of houses along Hopson Road, which curves south, southeast off of the frontage road.⁷ (Id. at 47.)

C. The Jacksonville Beach Land Development Code

The Property is currently zoned “Residential, single family (RS–1)” under the Jacksonville Beach Land Development Code (“LDC”). (Pretrial Statement 9, Doc. 72.) RS–1 is one of thirteen zoning districts established in the LDC “to ensure that each permitted and conditional use is compatible with surrounding land uses, served by adequate public facilities, and sensitive to natural and coastal resources.” LDC Secs. 34–321, –322.⁸ The City's Comprehensive Plan calls for its land use regulations to include a classification for “Low Density Residential” of “[n]ot more than six (6) units per acre.” (Pl.'s Ex. 21 at COJB 00000266.) The RS–1 zoning district “implement[s] the low density residential land use district in the comprehensive plan” and “is intended to classify areas suitable for low density single-family residential development.” LDC Sec. 34–336. The Comprehensive Plan further provides that “future institutional uses (schools, churches, government buildings, fraternal groups, cemeteries, and health and public safety facilities) ... shall be located outside of areas proposed for low-density residential use....” (Pl.'s Ex. 21 at COJB 00000266.)

Each zoning district in the LDC, including RS–1, has certain “permitted uses” and “uses accessory to permitted uses” that are allowed in the district as of right and certain “conditional uses” that may be allowed upon submission of an application for a Conditional Use Permit (“CUP”) and the review and approval of the Planning and Development Director and the Planning Commission. LDC Secs. 34–41, –221 to –236, –321. For most of the relevant period, until September 15, 2014, “[s]ingle family dwellings,” “[p]ublic and private parks, playgrounds and recreational facilities,” and “Type I home occupation”⁹ uses were permitted as of right on property zoned RS–1. LDC Sec. 34–336(b). Permitted private parks, playgrounds and recreational facilities could not be for commercial use, however, and were restricted to “the sole use of residents living in the area where such facilities are located ....” Id. at (b)(2). Conditional uses on property zoned RS–1 included, among other things, “[r]eligious organizations” and “[p]ublic and private elementary and secondary schools and technical institutes, excluding trades schools and vocational schools.” Id. at (d).

“Religious organization means a structure or place in which worship, ceremonies, rituals, and education pertaining to a particular system of beliefs are held.” LDC Sec. 34–41. Out of the City's thirteen zoning districts, religious organizations are conditional uses in all five residential zones (RS–1, RS–2, RS–3, RM–1, and RM–2) and three of the five commercial zones (CPO, CS, CBD), are permitted as of right in the other two commercial zones (C–1, C–2), and are not permitted at all in the City's industrial zone (I–1), redevelopment district (RD), or planned unit development district (PUD). LDC Secs. 34–336 to –348. There are presently nineteen...