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City Settles RLUIPA Suit-- Church and City Both Get Money From Insurer

By Howard M. Friedman

After months of negotiations (see a href="http://religionclause.blogspot.com/2008/09/illinois-churchs-rluipa-lawsuit-settled.html"prior posting/a), under pressure from the Illinois Counties Risk Management Trust (ICRMT), its insurer, Carlinville, Illinois City Council has finally approved an agreement settling a lawsuit brought against it by the Carlinville Southern Baptist Church. The Southern Baptist group wants to use a former Wal-Mart building, zoned for commercial use, as a church, and sued under RLUIPA as well as the 1st and 14th Amendments when it was refused permission to do so. According to Friday's a href="http://www.thetelegraph.com/news/city_21419___article.html/church_council.html"Alton (IL) Telegraph/a, last Monday, City Council implemented the settlement by adopting an ordinance granting a special use permit to the church. The church will receive a check from ICRMT for $125,000. Interestingly, the city itself will receive from ICRMT a check for $50,000 to compensate it for its loss of economic development opportunities. The $50,000 might be used to explore forming a tax increment financing district in Carlinville.

Full post as published by Religion Clause on December 20, 2008 (boomark / email).