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Letter: P&Z Should Mind Legal Standards with Respect to Grace Farms
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As a taxpayer I write to share my apprehension that the legal standard being urged upon the Commission by the opponents of Grace Farms is Constitutionally suspect and, if applied by the Commission, could result in financial liability to the Town and its officials under the Third Force Bill of 1871, now 28 U.S. Code § 1983. Even if the legal standard urged by the opponents met the Constitutional standard of the Fifth Amendment, viz., the nuisance or “pig in the parlor” test laid down by Justice Sutherland for the Court in Village of Euclid v. Ambler Realty Co.. 272 U.S. 325 (1926), it likely would not meet the higher standard of the free expression clause of the First Amendment. In 2012 the opponents alleged that the purposes listed in the Foundation’s certificate of incorporation “go far beyond those activities that are typically held by a local New Canaan church.” In February, 2016, the then-chairman of the Commission, Mr. Papp, apparently said that the Commission “need[ed] to decide if the ancillary activities of the church are usual and customary activities of a church.” Attachments to recent letters to the Commission from David Markatos, listed “a number of activities which, in [the opponents’ view], are of the sort for which many other organizations in town would be required to seek approval, were they to occur at their facilities.” That the activities at Grace Farms go beyond those of a typical New Canaan church may be among the reasons for the Grace Church’s success and is clearly a legally improper basis for decision. Put differently, for proponents of Grace Farms to contend that the activities at Grace Farms are religious activities “cannot be deemed bizarre or incredible.” Frazee v. Illinois Dept., 489 U.S. 828, 834 n2 (1989).