In City of Woodinville v. Northshore United Church of Christ, (Wash. Ct. App., July 16, 2007), a Washington state appellate court upheld a lower court’s grant of a permanent injunction to prevent Northshore United Church of Christ and a housing organization, Share/Wheel, from hosting Tent City 4 on the Church’s property in Woodinville. Tent City is an encampment for the homeless that moves every 90 days. The city refused to process the sponsors’ application for a land use permit for the encampment because of a moratorium on accepting permits during a study of sustainable development plans for the area. It also denied a permit for the encampment to be located on city property.
The court rejected the Church’s claim that its free exercise rights, as protected by the first Amendment and the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, had been violated. It held that strict scrutiny was not required for the First Amendment claim, and that, under RLUIPA, the city’s actions had not placed a "substantial burden" on the Church’s free exercise rights. The Church had alternative ways of ministering to the homeless, such as sheltering them inside existing Church buildings or finding other private land to host Tent City.
