Theft from the Offering Plate

The circumstances detailed below describe a coordinated advance by agencies of the City of New York against churches and synagogues. Some may interpret these data in ways which suggest merely incompetence, misdirected priorities and bureaucratic lethargy of City officials. However, the facts themselves appear to suggest strongly that there is an intent to steal religious property and to compel the wasteful expenditure of religious funds in order to meet the excessive administrative demands of outrageous regulatory interpretations. Irrespective of intent, the City's actions contrive to cripple the ability of churches and synagogues to conduct their ministry according to the dictates of their Faith principles by draining resources away from religious ministry in a needless and wasteful fashion.

Taxing Exempt Property

In Walz v. Tax Commission, the U. S. Supreme Court upheld the tax exemption of religious properties. The Court noted that the power to tax is the power to control. It also declared that an impermissible "excessive entanglement" between state and church would inevitably follow any effort by the government to determine the market value of church or synagogue buildings, collect taxes and engage in foreclosure procedures against religious property.

New York State, recognizing the need to regularize the process by which exemptions were granted to properties owned by a wide range of nonprofit (including religious) organizations, adopted regulations in 1980 requiring an annual filing to renew tax exempt status. After an initial filing to establish qualification for tax exempt status [that is, the property is owned by a qualified nonprofit organization, is used by such an organization, and is used exclusively for qualified nonprofit purposes, e.g.. religious, charitable, educational, etc.], an annual filing thereafter would be a simple form to describe any change or to certify no change in either the organizational purposes or the use or occupancy of the property.

New York City implemented this law in 1982 and received annual renewal applications by each tax status day (January 5) through 1985. No renewal forms were mailed for filing in 1986 or 1987, allegedly because of a delay in printing. The Department of Finance assured many nonprofit umbrella organizations, including the Queens Federation of Churches, that it would receive advance notice of the mailing of renewal forms so as to be able to alert their constituents. The Commission also assured all parties that there would be adequate time in which to complete the forms. Notwithstanding these pledges, the Department of Finance mailed the renewal forms without advance notice on April 30, 1987, with a demand that they be completed and returned by May 15, 1987, under threat of summary loss of exemption.

Many organizations did not receive even this inadequate notice because of inaccuracies in the City's mailing list. The City continues to use addresses which, while perhaps technically within a string of contiguous property lots owned in common, are not valid mailing addresses according to the U. S. Postal Service; mail sent to such addresses would normally be returned undelivered, marked "No Such Number." The City fails to make corrections to its mailing list when notified by the Postal Service and, often, when notified directly by the property owner. Nevertheless, the City has arbitrarily changed mailing addresses with neither the authorization or knowledge of the owner, thereby misdirecting mail and rendering the unsuspecting property owner vulnerable to penalties, interest and, ultimately, the loss of property through foreclosure.

Water/Sewer Taxes Assessed to Exempt Property

New York State law provides for exemption from water and sewer taxes for most properties in New York City which are also exempt from real property tax. [The significant exception for synagogues and churches is that the rectory/parsonage/manse is not exempt from water and sewer taxes even though, if owned by the congregation, it is exempt from real property tax.]

The application process for this exemption involves not the Tax Commission or the Department of Finance but the Environmental Protection Administration's Department of Water Resources which has its own procedures. Among the requirements is to produce certified copies of property deeds and articles of incorporation which have already been filed to obtain the real property tax exemption from the Tax Commission. Inasmuch as the exemption from real property tax is a prerequisite to exemption from water/sewer taxes, this additional expense of time and funds to obtain certified copies is transparently unnecessary. In fact, there is no reason that this redundant application process could not be combined into a single process with that of the real property tax exemption and annual renewal.

The Bureau has a history of ignoring, losing, or otherwise not acting upon valid applications, resulting in errant assessments for water/sewer taxes to properties entitled to be exempt. Title to scores of churches and synagogues have recently been taken "in-rem" by the City because of its incorrect assessment of water/sewer taxes to properties which are properly entitled to exemption.

Inspection Fees Wrongly Assessed

The Department of Buildings and the Fire Department independently make inspection of buildings having permits as places of public assembly. These departments customarily assess inspection fees ranging from $55 to over $250 per room inspected. Churches, synagogues and other nonprofits are exempt from these fees. Nevertheless, they have frequently been charged. Some have paid them unaware of the exemption; others have had to waste the time of their pastor, rabbi or lay trustee to trace them down and have them canceled.
Notices from the Department of Buildings requiring compliance with the building code (for example, Local Law 16) come in an intentionally confusing form. The instructions are unhelpful as they do not distinguish whether or not the law applies to the particular building. For example, most church and synagogue buildings, by reason of their low-rise condition, are not affected by Local Law 16, yet many have been cited for not complying with that law. The City, in its records, knows the heights of buildings and simply should not harass owners of buildings to which a law does not apply.

Violation notices mailed by the Department of Building have neither a date nor a signature. They also provide no helpful information to describe what compliance is being sought by the Department. Cryptic references on unreadable, smudged carbon copies, are insufficient notice.

Building Code Reinterpretation Unlawfully Restricts Religion

Unless altered since 1968, all buildings constructed prior to 1968 are governed by the building code which was in force at the time of construction.

Both the Department of Buildings and the Fire Department have recently taken the position that the 1938 Building Code's exemption of churches and synagogues (along with other buildings, namely: monasteries, convents, prisons and asylums) from public assembly permit requirements applies only to the space used "regularly and exclusively" for worship. This specious definition limiting the exemption of a "church" or a "synagogue" building to only worship space is supported neither by fact or the 1938 Code itself (which defines space in religious structures as being used for religious "worship, instruction or recreation"). Rather, it is an unlawful effort by government to seek to define religion as only the liturgical act so as to be able to regulate the non-liturgical aspects of religious life as though they were merely secular events.

The Fire Department has argued before the Environmental Control Board that church or synagogue meeting halls, on the basis of their occasional use for a church supper, be considered as if they were F-4 assembly spaces (cabarets) in order to invoke the retroactive regulation requiring the installation of emergency lighting. The Fire Department's Counsel also asserted that any retroactively-required installation of such lighting would automatically bring with it all public assembly requirements from which pre-1968 church and synagogue buildings are exempt by Code.

Landmark Regulations Unlawfully Applied Without Notice or Due Process

The Landmarks Preservation Commission and the Department of Buildings take the position that they may restrict the lawful right of any property owner to obtain a construction or alteration permit whether or not the building has been designated as an official "landmark." If one of the Commission's minions merely likes the looks of your building, the Commission asserts that it can stop you from making any repairs or alterations even though there has been no hearing or official action. There is no warrant in law for this usurpation of property rights and the two City agencies are in collusion to violate constitutional due process requirements.

Already the Landmarks Commission has designated religious properties as landmarks 42 times more often than it has designated any other properties in the City of New York. The generally superior architecture style and quality of church buildings make them increasingly more visible and vulnerable to being included on such an unofficial "hit lists" and, thereby, being drawn into a confiscatory landmarking procedure precisely at the time a building repair, alternation or other construction is most needed. This has occurred in many cases.
One congregation was prevented from replacing (and saddled forever with the burden of maintaining) its crumbling church building when it was declared a "landmark," ostensibly because the building was a "masterful example of scientific eclecticism." The actual reason for the landmarks designation was precisely to prevent construction of a building which would block the window views of an adjacent apartment building. The Commission's actions in the celebrated St. Bartholomew's case are designed to benefit developer Lewis Rudin whose Lexington Avenue office tower would loose rear office window views of Park Avenue if the Church redeveloped its inadequate community house building.

In another recent case in Queens, lawful building permits for interior renovation on a Church that has never even been the subject of a New York City Landmarks Commission hearing were withheld by the Department of Buildings pending approval from the Landmarks Preservation Commission.

In-rem Procedures: "No Exit"

Foreclosure proceedings to take property for the nonpayment of taxes and fees have been commenced against hundreds of churches and synagogues throughout the five Boroughs. In almost all cases, the alleged charges are wrongly assessed because of the failure of some City agency either to act on a valid application for exemption or to file a timely rebate of fees wrongfully assessed, or — in a distressingly high number of cases — the failure of the City to communicate the existence of a problem to the property owner as a result of bad mailing addresses without follow-up by the City. There have been occasions when a congregation first learns about a pending in-rem action in a letter from a real estate vulture offering the buy the property at fire-sale prices.

After being listed in an in-rem action, title is taken by the City in a summary filing with the State's Supreme Court. The City then invites the church or synagogue to sign a lease and pay $50 per month for the opportunity to continue to use its own property, now held hostage by the City. With the distorted realities of Alice's Wonderland, the congregation must first obtain the exemption to which it is entitled and for which it had previously filed — the same exemption which the City had failed to issue correctly in the first place. The congregation is then faced with the burden of additional applications to the Comptroller to have all assessed taxes and fees canceled and then to the Division of Real Property to apply for the return of title to its own property. After having frustrated all earlier applications, the City requires these redundant measures be performed by a voluntary organization at considerable expense in terms of funds, time and energy that can only diminish its important religious mission.

The failure of the congregation, within a limited time period, to navigate this unnecessarily complicated procedure in the wonderland of slow bureaucrats will place it again in-rem the following year and require it to start all over again. The process is intentionally tortured so as to trap congregations unsophisticated in the wiles of imperious government bureaucracies.

A Malicious Bias Against Religion and Race

This active hostility to church and synagogue is not limited to attacks directly against religious property.
The Board of Education regularly rents space in public school buildings in the evenings and on weekends to a variety of community organizations, including religious groups.

The Board has taken steps to deny renting space in Public School 60 in Woodhaven, Queens, to a church for Sunday worship during reconstruction of the church's own building which is located in the same district. The Board cites internal regulations which claim to allow charitable fund raising so long as it does not benefit a religion and to allow the distribution of literature so long at it is not religious literature. Religion alone is singled out for discrimination in the rental of space in a public school building by a church or a synagogue.
When a government agency makes space available, as the Board does is renting school facilities, it creates a limited "public forum." The U. S. Supreme Court, in Widmer v. Vincent, ruled that the agency cannot deny use of the property on the basis of the particular viewpoints to be espoused (i.e., religious viewpoints). To do so, the Court said, violates the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment.

Evidence demonstrates that the Board has, in fact, regularly chosen to ignore these illegal guidelines in the past and permitted congregations to rent school property for worship. The significant difference in this present case is that a predominantly Black congregation is renting space in a school located in a predominantly White neighborhood.

The Church has filed a Section 1983 civil rights action in Federal District Court challenging the central Board of Education and Community School Board No. 27 on the basis of both religious and racial discrimination. The Court has issued a preliminary injunction against the Board of Education requiring it to continue to rent to the Church until a trial can be held.

City Evades Responsibilities by Dumping Them on Congregations

In direct violation of State regulations, local centers of the Department of Social Services regularly send clients to church and synagogue emergency food pantries rather than issue an Emergency Needs Grant as required by State law. The burden of supporting public assistance recipients is, thereby, deliberately shifted from the tax base to the Church and Synagogue.

This pattern is not new. In 1980, after signing a consent decree agreeing to provide housing for the City's homeless, the Mayor sought to coerce churches and synagogues into providing that shelter. Several congregations which did respond were subsequently rewarded with harassment by the Department of Buildings because the structures were not intended or certified as domiciles.

Let Churches and Synagogues Pursue Their Ministry

Synagogues and churches are religious communities organized for the sole purpose of religious ministry. That ministry cannot be exercised in the abstract, but only in the world which God has given us. The First Amendment guarantees religious liberty in this nation by demanding that government neither "establish" a religion nor interfere with the "free exercise" of religion. Laws exempting churches and synagogues from supporting the government through taxes are a part of the history of preventing government from interfering with religious ministry. The anti-establishment clause prohibits government from supporting religion. The two spheres — church and state — coexist with neither drawing its support from the other.

To the degree that government creates regulations which are unduly burdensome, requiring the unnecessary and, thereby, wasteful expenditure of religious resources — funds, time, personnel — it is violating the Constitutional principles of the First Amendment.

To the degree that government seeks to evade its own lawful obligations to provide for the general welfare and places the burden of public assistance for the needy on religious groups, it places an improper tax upon them.

To the degree that government actively discriminates against religious groups by denying them access to public facilities regularly made available to others, it denies rights solely on the basis of religious commitment and ministry.

The indisputable result of this pattern of government conduct is the systematic usurpation of resources — a theft — from synagogues and churches and the diminution of those resources available to minister to the human and spiritual hungers of God's children.

Let your elected officials know that you know of this Administration's shameful scheme to steal churches and synagogues.

Tell them that you want it stopped now!