Cottonwood asks federal court to block Cypress land grab

Jun 24, 2002

Cottonwood Christian Center today filed a motion for a preliminary injunction that would block the City of Cypress, California from taking possession of the church's property near the Los Alamitos Race Track. A hearing on the motion will be held in federal court in Santa Ana, California on July 15. The church also filed a motion in state court that would put matters there on hold, pending resolution of the federal court action.

The injunction would "prevent the City of Cypress and the Cypress Redevelopment Agency from taking any additional steps towards the unlawful condemnation of Cottonwood's real property." In a memorandum accompanying the motion, the church charges that the city's "flagrant abuse of the eminent domain power offends two distinct constitutional guarantees." First, "taking property to be used for religious exercise ‘substantially burdens' that religious exercise," and second, "taking property from a non-profit church to accommodate a for-profit retailer not only fails to satisfy the ‘public use' requirement of the Fifth Amendment, it would turn that requirement on its head."

The church bought the land in question in 1999, assembling six separate parcels into a single 18 acre site on which it plans to build a new 300,000 square foot worship center. The worship hall at the church's current site in Los Alamitos has room for just 700 people, requiring that they hold six separate services each weekend to accommodate 4,000 members. Even then the church must turn people away.

Cottonwood began searching for a larger site in 1994, and after completing the purchase of the new property, applied for a conditional use permit on October 6, 2000. On a pretext that the CUP application was incomplete, the city rejected it (not admitting the error until more than a year later), and immediately slapped a moratorium on development in the area that had the appearance of applying to a large area, but which in practice affected only Cottonwood. Cypress used the moratorium to locate a large retailer that would be willing to occupy the site if the city obtained it for them; Cypress has engaged in exclusive negotiations with Costco for that purpose. Finally, on May 28, 2002, the City Council, sitting as the Redevelopment Agency, voted to take the church's land away.

Cottonwood Christian is represented by The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty and by the law firm of Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton. The full text of the motion and memorandum filed today, and much additional information, can be found on The Becket Fund's web sites, www.becketfund.org and www.rluipa.com.

Relevant Cases

• Cottonwood Christian Center v. City of Cypress