Temple of 1001 Buddhas v. City of Fremont

Background

Miaolan Lee lived on property owned by the Temple of 1001 Buddhas in Fremont. The property contained several structures used for religious purposes, including the Main Buddha Hall, Meditation Hall, and Retreat House. The City investigated the property for years regarding alleged violations of city codes and California laws concerning construction, safety, permitting, fire hazards, environmental conditions, and land use.

The City issued notices and orders concerning the property, including an amended March 2021 Notice and Order to Abate Nuisance. That document identified thirteen violations and required demolition of three buildings. Lee and the Temple sued the City. After the court dismissed their original complaint with permission to amend, they filed an amended complaint containing nine claims.

Legal standard

The City moved to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6), which allows dismissal when a complaint does not allege enough facts to state a legally valid and plausible claim. In deciding that motion, the court generally treated the complaint’s factual allegations as true and considered certain documents incorporated into the complaint or subject to judicial notice.

Section 1983 claims

Claims 1 through 4 were brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. They alleged violations involving religious exercise, racial and national-origin discrimination, retaliation, and unreasonable searches. Because the only defendant was the City, the plaintiffs had to plead municipal liability under the rule from Monell v. Department of Social Services. That rule requires a constitutional injury caused by an official municipal policy, a longstanding custom, or a final policymaker’s decision; a city cannot be liable solely because it employs an individual who allegedly committed a wrong.

The court held that Lee did not adequately allege that the City’s conduct resulted from an official policy or longstanding custom. The court also concluded that, even assuming Gary West could be a final policymaker for some building-code matters, Lee did not plausibly allege that West caused a constitutional violation or ratified one committed by a subordinate.

For the religious-exercise claim, the court found that the City’s enforcement against three buildings in severe alleged noncompliance did not substantially burden Lee’s religious practice because she could exercise her religion elsewhere on the property. For the race and national-origin discrimination claim, the court found no plausible facts showing discriminatory intent. Lee’s allegation that a white neighbor received less enforcement was insufficient because she did not adequately allege that the neighbor was similarly situated or that West made the relevant decision.

The retaliation claim also failed because Lee did not plausibly allege a substantial causal relationship between protected complaints and the City’s enforcement actions. The court found that the inspection warrant had a factual basis and that the complaint did not show West was involved in obtaining it. The court also found that Lee had not adequately connected the later enforcement order to her protected activity.

The unreasonable-search claim was dismissed as untimely because the challenged searches and camera surveillance occurred in 2018, while the complaint was filed in 2021, beyond California’s two-year limitations period for these claims. The court also found that the claim was inadequately pleaded and was not sufficiently connected to West’s policymaking authority.

Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act claims

Claims 5 through 7 arose under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, a federal law that can prohibit a government from substantially burdening religious land use through a zoning or land-use regulation without satisfying strict requirements. The claims challenged Fremont Municipal Code section 18.55.110, either facially, as applied to West’s statement that Lee could pray only in certain structures, or as applied through the amended abatement order.

The court held that the plaintiffs lacked standing to challenge section 18.55.110 under that federal law. The plaintiffs repeatedly described their proposed religious use as private, while the challenged code provision restricted certain quasi-public uses whose primary purpose was serving the general public. The court concluded that the provision therefore did not apply to the plaintiffs’ stated use. The court also held that, even if the provision caused an injury, an injunction would not likely redress it because the abatement order was independently supported by numerous other city and state law violations.

The court separately held that West’s alleged statement limiting where Lee could pray was not plausibly alleged to be an application of a zoning or landmarking law. The court therefore dismissed that claim as well.

California claims

Claim 8 sought a declaration that private or quasi-public religious use was permitted under the property’s land conservation contract. The court held that Lee lacked standing because the contract did not cause a concrete, imminent injury. The City’s enforcement action was based on alleged violations of state and city laws, not on an alleged violation of the contract, and Lee could end the contract at the end of an annual term. The court dismissed the claim and found amendment futile.

Claim 9 alleged that section 18.55.110 violated the California Constitution’s Free Exercise Clause. The court concluded that Lee again misunderstood the provision because she alleged that her intended use was private, not quasi-public. The court permitted another attempt to amend this claim and suggested that any amended claim focus on how the abatement order itself burdened religious exercise rather than on section 18.55.110.

Disposition

Judge Charles R. Breyer granted the City’s motion to dismiss all claims. The court denied leave to amend Claims 2, 4, and 8 as futile. It granted leave to amend Claims 1, 3, 5, 6, 7, and 9, and allowed Lee to file an amended complaint within 21 days of the order.