Church's mission unfazed by fight
Now that the Second Baptist Church of Homestead has its permit to occupy the former Grace Christian Ministries church in West Mifflin, it begins a process of shifting its congregation's focus across municipal borders.
Since the fight to get the permit involves a federal civil rights lawsuit against West Mifflin, church officials naturally are apprehensive.
"It doesn't look like they really want us," the church pastor, the Rev. Donald P. Turner, said Tuesday at a news conference. "But as black people, we've gone places we haven't been wanted all along."
The church and the American Civil Liberties Union sued West Mifflin and its zoning officer in October, claiming borough officials had approved mostly white Grace Christian to use the property for religious purposes but denied, without explanation, Second Baptist's application to use the site for similar purposes.
On Monday, Second Baptist received notice that the borough had granted the congregation an occupancy permit. The borough has argued that it denied the permit — requested in July — because church officials indicated the Coal Road site would be used primarily as a for-profit day care, which is prohibited in a residential area. Borough officials said they decided to grant the permit after hearing church leaders testify in federal court they intend to move their congregation onto the property.
The borough has maintained the denial was a zoning issue that had nothing to do with discrimination. They have threatened a countersuit against the ACLU, claiming the group pushed the church to file a discrimination suit rather than work through the standard appeal process.
"This is essentially the ACLU manufacturing a lawsuit in large part for its own self-serving interest in pursuing their own legal fees through a federal lawsuit," Mike Adams, solicitor for the borough zoning hearing board, said yesterday. "West Mifflin's not going to be the punching bag for the ACLU."
Witold "Vic" Walczak, legal director for the Pittsburgh ACLU office, said the U.S. Department of Justice contacted him in early November about the case. While the department has not formally intervened, he said authorities have requested pertinent federal court transcripts and documents. Walczak said he expects to hear by Thursday whether the Justice Department will take a more active role.
Jon Pushinsky, a private attorney working with the ACLU, said the remaining portion of the case includes seeking damages for losses in the past five months that would amount to "well into five figures." The ACLU will seek to prove the borough violated the federal Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act.
Turner — who said he has no animosity toward West Mifflin — said his church will use the facility mostly for fellowship activities like wedding receptions and funerals because the church's Homestead site is too small. Church officials plan to eventually build a new facility that will allow them to hold all services in West Mifflin.
Before any of that can happen, the sale of the land must be finalized, something Second Baptist's attorney, Thomas Earhart, said should happen by year's end. Some money from the $950,000 sale will pay restitution to victims of the Rev. Michael Altman, the former Grace Christian pastor who pleaded no contest to charges of duping investors out of $355,553 in a phony securities scheme. Altman was sentenced June 5 to four to eight years in prison and 20 years' probation.
