Religion and Land Use

[Scarberry, Mark]

I believe my colleague Shelley Saxer has written on the subject. Her e mail
address is ssaxer at pepperdine.edu.

Anecdotally, I once spoke with the person in my church denomination who was
responsible for starting new churches. He told me that in some cities in
California it was nearly impossible to find land that was zoned or that
could be rezoned for church use. I believe the local officials often cite
loss of tax revenues as a basis for opposing approval of new churches and
other places of worship. If that is the real reason then presumably they
would oppose other nonprofit (and nontaxable) uses as well; I don't know
whether that is the case.

Mark S. Scarberry
Pepperdine University School of Law
mscarber at pepperdine.edu


-----Original Message-----
From: Alexander Dushku [mailto:ADUSHKU at KMCLAW.COM]
Sent: Wednesday, October 20, 1999 12:36 PM
To: RELIGIONLAW at listserv.ucla.edu
Subject: Religion and Land Use


Does anyone know of a case or article arguing that local land use officials
at times undervalue free exercise interests, especially when determining
where or whether a church can be built within a municipality?