Over two decades ago, the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) was enacted to shield certain societal segments from unfair bias. While commendably serving its intended function, RLUPIA has occasionally been subverted by religious institutions to justify, with impunity, unfair and, at times, illegal harassment and harm of law-abiding citizens. A notable instance occurred last year with the Giac Son Buddhist Temple in South Laurel (on Rt 197 just east of Snowden Road), when the Prince George’s County Planning Board appeared to change course after the temple strongly raised RLUIPA, and rapidly approved the temple’s requested exemptions and their application to greatly expand.
Initially, when this temple began nearly a decade ago, we neighbors were open and welcoming, particularly those among us with Buddhist heritage who associate Buddhism with thoughtfulness, caring, and deep respect for harmony and nature. However, the temple’s subsequent conduct has proven the antithesis of these values and been a blight on our community’s tranquility and environmental integrity.
Early-on, two of us neighbors approached the monk while he was illegally removing a decades-old stormwater management berm and clearing the roots from many old-growth trees the temple had illegally removed without a grading permit. Our trying to kindly explain the value of that berm and those trees in stormwater mitigation was met with hostility, with the monk physically threatening us with a pickaxe. Unsurprisingly, the temple’s removal of that critical berm, as well as of their trees and forest cover, replacing with packed crushed stone to create a parking lot, directly led to massive flooding of four of us neighbors’ properties and houses—with damages in excess of $100,000.
Furthermore, for many years the temple has broadcast amplified noise—including chants, moans, karaoke, and bands—often morning to evening, and incredibly loud. Using a county-calibrated sound meter, this noise has routinely been measured at over ten thousand times the permitted sound amplitude (over 105 dB at the temple’s property line, with 65 dB the maximal permissible, and each 10 dB being 10-fold higher amplitude). That hellishly loud noise has not only been extremely disturbing to our previously tranquil community but poses a severe medical threat to a special needs child in our community, inducing seizures, despite attempting to shield him from the noise with closed windows and sound-blocking devices. Other neighbors suffering from PTSD have found their symptoms exacerbated by the noise, further impacting their well-being. Yet the temple’s representative responded to noise complaints by saying that we neighbors should be appreciative of their broadcasting, as it is to drive out the evil that they determined lives in our neighborhood. Might he mean the members of our diverse community?
Another highly unneighborly action by the temple has been having the outflow from a large sink, which for years they have used to illegally prepare food for sale, flow directly onto the ground and into the property of one of us neighbors, where it has attracted infestations of vermin and mosquitos. Exacerbating this blight, temple personnel have emptied their cooking remnants (not only food but also cooked bones and shells) into the backyard of another neighbor—possibly explaining the mysterious death of two of her beloved dogs.
Shockingly, the temple also unilaterally “appropriated” about 8,000 square feet of that latter neighbor’s property and some additional land from the former neighbor’s property, cleared its old growth trees, laid gravel and pavers, erected a 15-foot-tall Buddha statue and a fence. For years, they have used that appropriated property for religious services as well as for parking. Ten months ago, the temple’s official plans even publicly acknowledged this was an “incursion,” but not until eight months after that did they finally remove the Buddha statue, and still now, they have not repaired our land but instead continue to use it as their parking lot.
Patrons of the temple also routinely walk through and litter on, even park on, our nearby properties. Other infractions by the temple include several years ago expanding their current house far in excess of what their approved building plans permitted. Regrettably, the county’s extremely lackadaisical approach to enforcing their laws pertaining to the above-described matters, despite our numerous complaints over the years to 311, 911, the Department of Permitting, Inspection and Enforcement (DPIE), and the police, likely emboldened the temple’s actions.
With this background of unneighborly and illegal activities, last year the temple applied to construct a large new sanctuary. In fact, their submitted plans reveal the building to be much larger than their text claims—so large that a subdivision plan would be required. Additionally, their building application shows their intent to place a large fraction of the trees they are required to plant (including to replace the many thousands of square feet of trees they illegally took down) within the berm of a requisite stormwater facility—a practice forbidden by county instructions, since tree roots degrade a berm’s integrity. Their application also requested approval to take down their last two specimen trees; however, the temple had already illegally taken these trees down months earlier, ironically on Earth Day. They argued that the trees’ roots had been compacted; however, that was due to the temple’s previous illegal grading and graveling of the surrounding land.
Furthermore, the temple failed to have their property surveyed by a licensed surveyor and thus their plans incorrectly presented the property boundaries with yet another neighbor, other than the one mentioned above. Accounting for those correct boundaries substantially increases the lot coverage of the temple’s intended development and contributes to it being well over the maximally permitted 50%. Despite those and other issues that we neighbors raised, after the temple’s lawyer strongly called out the specter of RLUIPA, the Planning Board appeared to change course and quickly approved the temple’s plan and multiple requests for exemptions.
Later last fall, after reviewing the Planning Board’s decision and appeals that were filed about it, the District Council (which is the County Council wearing different hats) agreed to consider this application. Fortunately, at their hearing in January, the District Council was much more attentive to the irregularities of the temple’s plan, as well as to the rights of us neighbors, than the Planning Board had been, even though the temple’s lawyer again called out RLUIPA. When she explicitly stated that the temple personnel feel that they are suffering religious discrimination from us neighbors, both Council Chair Jolene Ivey and At-Large Councilman Calvin Hawkins said they had seen no evidence of that. People’s Zoning Council, Stan Brown, very eloquently summarized many of the temple’s above-described infractions of the county’s law, both in their actions and in their plans, and he noted remedies the temple would need to do to comply with county regulations. These actions included filing a subdivision plan or substantially reducing the size of the intended building, as well as getting an approved stormwater plan that meets county regulations. Eventually the application was remanded to the Planning Board, which hopefully will take the county’s regulations more seriously than the last time. Also, Council Chair Ivey got the temple’s agreement to stop the amplified outdoor broadcasting, starting immediately. What a blessing for the neighborhood!
Another big positive is that unlike in past years, when the complaints about the noise, cooking run-off, etc., that we filed to 311 and DPIE seemed to have minimal effect, now an excellent DPIE officer is working hard to assure that the temple follows county laws. All of us neighbors certainly hope that the temple will start abiding by the county’s laws for noise, food sales, run-off, property boundaries, etc., which are meant to provide fairness, peace, and safety for all. It certainly would be wonderful if everyone could start living in harmony.
However, there are still issues. The temple’s most recent service for the Lunar New Year again involved cooking in their unlicensed garage kitchen and illegally selling food, with their attendees parking on our properties and trespassing through our yards. Also, we just learned that after the neighbor into whose backyard the temple had been dumping their cooking remnants eventually convinced the monk to cease that practice, rather than starting to healthfully dispose of the coming remnants into the compost that the County picks up weekly, they instead just moved the location to instead dump it behind the barn of another neighbor, despite the County Health Department saying it is strictly illegal to dump cooking residue on the ground.
It remains to be seen whether matters will resolve so that the neighborhood can return to a peaceful existence. Our collective experience underscores the complex dynamics of RLUIPA’s implementation and its potential for exploitation, highlighting the ongoing struggle for balance between religious freedom and community rights.