God's Green Earth? The Environmental Impacts of Religious Land Use

Abstract

This article explores the negative environmental consequences of a federal law, known as RLUIPA – the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000. RLUIPA was passed with the intention of protecting religious land users from discrimination in the zoning process. However, RLUIPA casts a far wider net: it allows religious entities to sue local governments for requiring them to comply with generally applicable zoning laws if those laws impose a “substantial burden” on their religious exercise. No evidence, or even allegation, of discrimination is required. As a result, religious entities are now exempt from numerous zoning laws, leaving local governments to struggle with a myriad of unintended consequences. In particular, communities are faced with the negative environmental impacts of a category of land users exempt from environmental zoning laws.

This article contends that the identity of the land user is irrelevant when measuring negative environmental impacts and that by allowing religious entities to use their property in ways that no other land users can, RLUIPA threatens to undermine local environmental zoning and land use laws nationwide. The article argues that protecting religious entities from discrimination should not require eviscerating environmental protection laws. It offers suggestions for how courts can more narrowly interpret RLUIPA to avoid unintended consequences on the environment, while still ensuring that religious land users are not discriminated against.

Keywords: land use, religion, RLUIPA, local government, zoning, environmental law