c. 1996 Religion News Service
(RNS)-Churches and other non-profit organizations have long enjoyed exemption from property taxes, but this fall Colorado voters could make their state the first in the nation to end that tradition.
John Patrick Michael Murphy, a Colorado Springs personal injury attorney, has collected nearly 90,000 signatures in support of a constitutional amendment that would force thousands of religious, philanthropic and community organizations to pay taxes on their land, buildings and personal property.
Colorado officials have until Feb. 17 to decide if enough signatures are valid to place the proposed measure on the Nov. 5 state ballot. They estimate the amendment would return nearly $3 billion worth of property to tax rolls, generating $70 million in new property taxes annually.
Not all non-profit and religious organizations would lose their tax-exempt status. Murphy says groups that meet a public”duty”test, such as those that provide housing for orphans, the elderly, disabled and homeless, would not have to pay property taxes. But most non-profits would.”We simply want churches and charities to pay their fair share,”Murphy says.”The motive is tax fairness. One person shouldn’t have to shoulder the burden of another.” Murphy claims that in the long run, churches and charities would see a rise in income if the measure passes because Coloradans would have more disposable income to donate. “We’re going to return more money to the pews than we’re going to extract from the pulpits,”he says.”These preachers ought to trust their parishioners.” But opponents describe the initiative as the most draconian assault on the state’s religious and charitable organizations in Colorado history.
The initiative would end property tax exemptions for some 5,000 churches, synagogues and mosques; more than 1,500 nonprofit organizations involved in everything from arts and athletics to zoos; thousands of acres of Christian and New Age camp and retreat properties; more than 500 hospitals and health clinics; hundreds of Moose lodges and other fraternal organization properties; and most of the state’s cemeteries and soup kitchens.”What this comes down to is people taking a rather short-sighted look toward what’s going to stay in my pocketbook as opposed to what kind of community do I want to live in and do I want my children to live in,”says Pat Read, executive director of the Colorado Association of Nonprofit Organizations.
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The son and grandson of Irish Catholics, Murphy, 50, describes himself as an agnostic and freethinker who believes religion and government should be strictly separate. He is a supporter of the Madison, Wis.-based Freedom from Religion Foundation, a church-state separation group that wants to stop all government support of religious organizations.
Well-known in Colorado Springs as a radio talk show host, he has spent $60,000 of his own money on the amendment initiative. He works from an office decorated with western paintings, century-old rifles and a menagerie of stuffed mountain lions, armadillos and rattlesnakes.
Just before Pope John Paul II visited Colorado in 1993, Murphy publicly released a letter he sent the pope, requesting an apology to Catholics who as children had been sexually abused by priests. Murphy claims he himself was repeatedly molested by a Colorado priest from age 7 or 8 until his teens.
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Murphy’s initiative is the first statewide effort to cut nonprofits’ tax exemptions. Similar efforts have been attempted-without success-in Berkeley, Calif., and several other localities.”We’re taking this pretty seriously, unfortunately,”says Read, who believes the amendment would cause many large nonprofits to fire workers and slash services. As for smaller, cash-strapped groups, she says,”the results would be disastrous.” The Rev. Lucia Guzman, executive director of the Colorado Council of Churches, says the amendment would force hundreds of small and inner-city churches to close.”This will be like killing the soul of our communities,”says Guzman.
In Colorado Springs, a city of 280,000 nestled at the foot of Pikes Peak, some amendment foes claim the measure marks an effort to halt the influx and growth of evangelical Christian organizations, which have earned the city the moniker”the Vatican of American evangelicalism.” The city is home to more than 70 Christian ministries and businesses, including the Navigators, Young Life and the International Bible Society, which have a combined annual income of more than $600 million.
The largest and most controversial of the city’s nonprofit evangelical groups is Focus on the Family, a media ministry with annual income of $101 million.
Focus on the Family has been active in a number of controversial policy issues on both the state and federal levels. It supported a state constitutional amendment limiting homosexual rights, and ministry founder James Dobson has vociferously urged an outright ban on abortion.
Some backers of the property tax amendment point to Dobson’s views on abortion-and his group’s conservative evangelical activism-as an example of why most religious groups should lose their tax-exempt status.”I’m a pro-choice activist, and Focus on the Family is one of the biggest publishers of anti-choice literature in America,”says Janet Brazill of Colorado Springs, one of about 80 people who volunteered to circulate petitions throughout the state.”I also support religious liberty, but through my taxes I’m forced to support local missionary groups who go to other countries to force their beliefs on people. I would rather put my money toward things I believe in.” But Paul Hetrick, spokesman for Focus on the Family, says the initiative represents a form of”economic hostility toward churches and nonprofits.” He also charges that petition circulators have acted dishonestly by not telling voters about the economic impact ministries like Focus on the Family have in the state.”In the early 1990s, some of the nonprofits, along with a few for-profit companies, were very much a part of helping turn around the local economy,”Hetrick says.”Our payroll in this community is $35 million a year, almost all of which comes into Focus from (donors) outside the state.” Published accounts report the ministry would have to pay an annual property tax bill of up to $570,000. Hetrick said Focus on the Family had not yet run its own numbers.
Guzman and Read have discussed ways Colorado’s nonprofits can fight the amendment, but the IRS restricts the amount of lobbying and campaigning they can do. And Guzman says she is uncomfortable with churches practicing self-promotion and spin control.”Are we going to need to begin placing a dollar value on saving a soul or the effect of a sermon?”she says.”We’ve never had to do that before, and I’m not sure we want to do that.” (STORY CAN END HERE. BEGIN SECOND OPTIONAL TRIM)
It remains to be seen whether Murphy’s amendment will pass muster with Colorado legal officials-and ultimately with voters if the measure is placed on the ballot.
Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, a Washington-based advocacy group, says the initiative is poorly constructed and inconsistent. For example, it would allow exemptions for church-based shelters that provide housing for abused spouses, but not for churches that provide free counseling to battered women. “I don’t think that we can allow the government, including the voters of the state of Colorado, to define the mission of the church,”says Lynn.
And some government officials say initiative supporters have overstated the potential tax savings of the measure.”At best, the owner of the average Colorado Springs house will save $44 a year on a $110,000 house,”says John Bass, chief appraiser with the assessor’s office in El Paso County, which includes Colorado Springs.”This initiative is going to be opening up a can of worms that will cost thousands of dollars, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars, in litigation fees.” Edward McGlynn Gaffney, dean of the Valparaiso University School of Law in Valparaiso, Ind., and an expert on religious tax issues, called the Colorado initiative”one of the most hostile measures imaginable.” The measure would reverse two centuries of government support for churches and charities, which have traditionally been viewed as providing a variety of essential social services, both tangible and intangible, practical and spiritual, Gaffney says.”The message these disgruntled Colorado taxpayers seem to want to send is nonprofits that can afford to should begin to pack their bags,”he says.
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