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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowHendricks County government has agreed to pay $300,000 and change its zoning policies to settle allegations that it violated federal laws by denying zoning approval for an Islamic seminary and accompanying housing.
The agreement comes after a U.S. Department of Justice investigation into allegations that the county twice unlawfully denied zoning approval to the company Al Hussnain Inc. The company sought to develop a religious seminary, K-12 religious school, and residential housing in the county.
“Animus directed towards the Muslim community masked under the guise of an ordinary zoning restrictions violates the law and runs contrary to the principles of fairness and tolerance that are core in our democracy,” Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Civil Rights Division said in a written statement.
“Federal law prohibits local governments from making zoning decisions about housing or religious land use on the basis of the religion of the developer or those whom they perceive might live at or worship at the development,” she added. “The Justice Department will use its authority to stop discriminatory anti-Islamic conduct and hold local governments accountable.”
The federal government sued the county, alleging violations of the Fair Housing Act and Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act.
The county agreed to settle the lawsuit by paying $295,000 to Al Hussnain Inc. and a civil penalty of $5,000 to the U.S. government. It also must adopt fair housing and appropriate religious land use policies and and train its officials and employees on the requirements of those laws.
The settlement agreement is awaiting review by the U.S. District Court in Indianapolis.
Al Hussnain Inc. and Hendricks County officials did not immediately respond to Indiana Lawyer’s request for comment.
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Is anyone shocked that Hendricks Co. tries to discrimination against minorities?
I designed churches over most of the eastern half of the United States and we ran into this same sort of thing with Christian Churches too. Most of the time the Churches lost. We built a church out on Long Island in New York (which did get built after 2 years) and the zoning board asked us “what are a bunch of hog farmers from Indiana doing building churches in Long Island New York.” So its not a new thing.
Neil D, that would have been quite a headline if it were real rather than just your attempt to deflect through invention from actual discriminatory practices.
I’d heard that Indianapolis has more churches per capita than any city in the US. I know in city government, the attitude is if it’s a church, then they can do anything they want as long as it doesn’t actually violate building codes, which are pretty reasonable.
Application for housing, a private school, and a church should have been pretty easy as long as they handled the basic things like set back, drainage, etc…
One development was denied due to the massive use of water that was demanded from that many residences and the other development was protested due to the volume of traffic it was estimated from the residents plus the school, so who is being treated unfairly?
It does not matter if it is one development or a 1,000 developments, the long -standing law is very clear. If the reason for the denial of a zoning request is religious discrimination, then it is illegal.
Also, if water usage or some other issue is given as a pretext for denial but the real reason is religious discrimination, then it is still illegal. Otherwise, local governments would always give phony reasons for denial and break the law with impunity.
The county settled for a reason, obviously their defense was not very strong.