WILSON, Circuit Judge:
Under the doctrine known as ripeness, we must determine that a given issue is sufficiently developed (i.e., ripe) for judicial intervention before we will exercise jurisdiction over it. This appeal presents the question whether an Orthodox Jewish synagogue's statutory and constitutional challenges to its designation as a historic landmark by a municipality are ripe for adjudication. We begin with the background facts necessary to our discussion.
Temple B'Nai Zion (Temple) is a Sephardic Jewish religious organization that operates an Orthodox Jewish synagogue in the City of Sunny Isles Beach, Florida ("Sunny Isles Beach" or "City"). The Temple purchased the land on which it is currently situated from the Sunny Isles Epiphany Lutheran Church in 1977. Because the building had previously housed a Christian church, the Temple made certain modifications to minimize Christian symbols on the property, including removing many of the stained-glass windows and attempting to conceal the cross-shaped design of the main sanctuary. The Temple then began operating as a Conservative Judaic house of worship, and by 1986 the congregation had grown to some 400 families.
Over the years that followed, however, the Temple's membership languished, and by the early 2000s only about 100 members remained in the congregation. According to the Temple's complaint, the present saga began in 2004, when the Temple sought out Rabbi Aaron Lankry for assistance in increasing the membership of the congregation and in raising funds for the Temple's operations. Soon thereafter Rabbi Lankry began to align the Temple's religious beliefs with the Orthodox form of Judaism. Orthodox Judaism is a formulation of the religion that adheres to a rather strict interpretation and application of Talmudic law. In Orthodox synagogues, for example, men and women must be seated in separate sections, and the alignment of the synagogue must be such that the congregation faces east — toward Jerusalem — during prayers. Prior to the switch, the Temple had practiced Conservative Judaism, a modern approach to the religion that seeks to conserve traditional elements of the faith but nonetheless permits for some degree of modernization and rabbinical development. According to the Temple, the move from Conservative Judaism to Orthodox Judaism — a more stringent brand of the faith — angered some congregants, including Norman Edelcup, the current mayor of Sunny Isles Beach.
Earlier in 2004, Mayor Edelcup, while still a member of the Temple's congregation, conceived the idea of the City hosting a reunion for Sunny Isles Beach's approximately 300 Holocaust survivors. The event, which was held in the Temple's social hall on March 28, 2004, was attended by roughly 200 of the survivors.
Later that same year, after the Temple became Orthodox and Mayor Edelcup left the congregation, the Temple resolved to bring certain elements of its physical plant into alignment with its Orthodox religious precepts. Specifically, the Temple sought to rectify four issues that did not conform with its Orthodox beliefs: (1) the seating area of the sanctuary was facing west; (2) the floor plan was in the shape of a crucifix (from the building's time as a Lutheran church); (3) the seating area for the main sanctuary lacked separate sections for men and women; and (4) the building was shaped like a triangle to symbolize the Holy Trinity of the Christian faith. Because reconfiguring the building to address these issues would be difficult, the Temple decided to demolish the building and to reconstruct it in accordance with Orthodox religious precepts. To that end, in 2006 the Temple hired an architect to develop plans for a larger, Orthodox house of worship.
The City was not supportive of the Temple's expansion plans, and in the period that followed Rabbi Lankry met with Mayor Edelcup on several occasions to work out the differences. The meetings went badly. At one point, Mayor Edelcup allegedly referred to the Sephardic Jewish
In March 2006, the City's Historic Preservation Board (Preservation Board) met to consider certain properties for possible designation as historic sites. At that time, no site had ever been designated historic, despite the City's storied and socially significant past. Sunny Isles Beach was originally developed as a tourist resort in the 1920s, and expanded slowly until the 1940s, when it enjoyed rapid growth in tourism. The City's first four-story hotel, the Golden Strand, was built in 1946. Then, in 1949, the nation's first two-story "motor hotel," or motel, known as the Ocean Palm, was built in Sunny Isles Beach. A stretch of land known as "Motel Row" soon sprung up in the City, and before long there were countless motels in the bustling vacation community. Celebrities visited Sunny Isles Beach, too. The Golden Strand, which still exists today, hosted visitors including Grace Kelly, Burt Lancaster, Mike Todd, and Gary Cooper, as well as members of the Dupont, Vanderbilt, and Guggenheim families. To this day, a plaque in the Sunny Isles Beach Government Center notes that the last Florida residence of the legendary slugger Babe Ruth was at the Golden Strand Hotel, and certain illustrious musical acts such as The Beatles, Ike and Tina Turner, Ray Charles, and Frankie Vallie and the Four Seasons basked in the sun along Motel Row during this period.
The Preservation Board considered five properties for potential historic designation at its March 2006 meeting: (1) the Ocean Palm Motel (built in 1949), (2) the Golden Strand Hotel (built in 1946), (3) the Sahara Motel (built in 1953), (4) St. Mary Magdalen Catholic Church (built in 1961), and (5) the Temple (built in 1964). After hearing comments from interested parties, the Preservation Board declined to designate any of the sites as historic. The Preservation Board again considered the Temple for possible designation in 2008, but again decided against taking any action.
In 2009, another Orthodox Jewish congregation in Miami Beach, Beit Rambam, inquired with the Temple whether it might use some of the Temple's space for religious services. The Temple agreed, and entered into a lease agreement that permits Beit Rambam to use the main sanctuary, with the two congregations jointly sharing the other areas of the property. Because the combined congregations enjoyed larger membership and their arrangement increased the overall usage of the property, the Temple revisited its 2006 plans to demolish the building and construct a larger one in its stead. The Temple therefore applied for two building permits so that it could begin its planned construction. Both were denied.
The Temple alleges that in response to its renewed interest in expansion, the City
In January 2010, Uguccioni submitted a Historic Landmark Designation Report to the Preservation Board recommending that the Temple be designated a landmark. According to Uguccioni's report, the 2004 gathering of 200 Holocaust survivors at the Temple qualified the Temple as a historic site because it rendered the Temple "the site of an historic event with significant effect upon the community, City, state, or nation." Sunny Isles Beach, Fla., Code of Ordinances § 171-5(B). The Preservation Board met in March 2010, approved Uguccioni's report, and set a June hearing to consider the Temple's designation as a historic site. The Temple applied for yet another demolition permit in April 2010, which the City again refused. Further, the City Commission enacted a resolution in May that declared a temporary moratorium on the acceptance and processing of all applications for demolition of non-residential structures pending the City's study of potential additions to the City's register of historic sites. At that time, the City had yet to designate any site as historic, and according to the complaint the Temple was the only site then under consideration for such designation.
On June 22, 2010, the Preservation Board held a hearing to consider the designation of the Temple as a historic site. The Temple offered witnesses against the proposed designation, but based in part upon the gathering of Holocaust survivors, in addition to the Temple's purported "exemplif[ication] [of] the historical, cultural, political, economic, or social trends of the community," id. § 171-5(C), the Preservation Board voted 4 to 1 to designate the main sanctuary, portico, and memorial tower of the Temple a historic site and passed Resolution No. 2010-13 to that effect.
The Sunny Isles Beach Code of Ordinances provides that "[a]ny aggrieved party may appeal any decision of the [Preservation] Board to the City Commission" within 14 days of the designation of a given property as a historic site. Id. § 171-4(D)(1). "The decision of the City Commission [on appeal] shall constitute final administrative review, and no petition for rehearing or reconsideration shall be considered by the City." Id. § 171-4(D)(2). In conformance with that procedure, the Temple timely appealed the designation. At a public hearing held before the full City Commission on September 2, 2010, the same witnesses who had appeared before the Preservation Board appeared again and provided essentially the same testimony. Because the hearing was public, citizens were permitted to take the lectern and offer comments during the proceeding; many took the opportunity to complain about the operation of the Temple, accusing Rabbi Lankry and the Temple of removing memorial plaques from the walls, failing to light candles for deceased congregants, denying access to former congregants, and absconding with the Temple's Torahs. The City Commissioners — three out of five of whom were members of the Temple congregation before it became Orthodox — also offered public comments before voting on the designation. Commissioner Gerry Goodman, who had previously sat on the Temple's board of directors, for example, questioned Rabbi Lankry at length about why the Temple seemed to be closed to the public on certain days. Commissioner Goodman had purchased a memorial plaque for a loved one at the Temple some years earlier but had been unable to view the plaque when he attempted to do so. Goodman then began to ask Rabbi Lankry whether the Temple was being leased out, but Mayor Edelcup interjected, admonishing Goodman to "[f]ocus on the issues." Before closing his remarks, Goodman asked Rabbi Lankry whether Lankry had called him an anti-Semite in the local newspaper.
Following Commissioner Goodman's statement, Commissioner George "Bud" Scholl made the following statement for the record:
Despite Commissioner Scholl's comments, the City Commission voted 4 to 1 a few minutes later to designate the Temple as a historic site and enacted Resolution No. 2010-1597, which affirmed the Preservation Board's June decision declaring the Temple to be the City's first historic landmark. Commissioner Scholl was the lone dissenting vote. The Resolution provides, in pertinent part:
Following its official designation as historic, the Temple did not seek review of the merits of the City's decision via the Florida state-court procedure of common law certiorari. Instead, the Temple filed this lawsuit against the City and Norman Edelcup, alleging that the City's designation of its property as a historic landmark violated the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA), 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000cc to 2000cc-5; the Florida Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1998 (FRFRA), Fla. Stat. §§ 761.01 — .05; the Free Exercise Clause of the Florida Constitution; and the Equal Protection, Free Exercise, and Substantive Due Process Clauses of the United States Constitution by operation of 42 U.S.C. § 1983. In addition, the Temple sought a declaratory judgment that Code Section 171-5, the City Ordinance setting forth the standards for declaring historic landmarks in Sunny Isles Beach, is void for vagueness on its face.
The district court dismissed the Temple's complaint without prejudice after finding that the action was not yet ripe for review. In reaching that conclusion, the court relied upon the finality principles normally applied in takings cases, pursuant to which challenges to land use regulations "[are] not ripe until the government entity charged with implementing the regulations has reached a final decision regarding the application of the regulations to the property at issue." Williamson Cnty. Reg'l Planning Comm'n v. Hamilton Bank of Johnson City, 473 U.S. 172, 186, 105 S.Ct. 3108, 3116, 87 L.Ed.2d 126 (1985). The district court reasoned that because the Temple's chief complaint was its inability to expand due to the historical designation, the Temple needed to submit building plans and request a waiver or variance from the City before its constitutional, RLUIPA, and FRFRA claims would become ripe for adjudication. Finally, the district court dismissed the Temple's facial challenge to Section 171-5 of the City Code based upon "prudential considerations of ripeness," which we take to mean that the district court dismissed the facial challenge so that it could be brought contemporaneously with the Temple's as-applied
Born from both Article III and prudential concerns, "[r]ipeness is a justiciability doctrine designed `to prevent the courts, through avoidance of premature adjudication, from entangling themselves in abstract disagreements over administrative policies.'" Nat'l Park Hospitality Ass'n v. Dep't of Interior, 538 U.S. 803, 807, 123 S.Ct. 2026, 2030, 155 L.Ed.2d 1017 (2003) (quoting Abbott Labs. v. Gardner, 387 U.S. 136, 148, 87 S.Ct. 1507, 1515, 18 L.Ed.2d 681 (1967), abrogated on other grounds by Califano v. Sanders, 430 U.S. 99, 97 S.Ct. 980, 51 L.Ed.2d 192 (1977)). The doctrine serves the additional purpose of "shield[ing] agencies from judicial interaction `until an administrative decision has been formalized and its effects felt in a concrete way by the challenging parties.'" Konikov v. Orange County, 410 F.3d 1317, 1322 (11th Cir.2005) (per curiam) (quoting Abbott Labs., 387 U.S. at 148-49, 87 S.Ct. at 1515). Put another way, "[h]aste makes waste, and the premature adjudication of legal questions compels courts to resolve matters, even constitutional matters, that may with time be satisfactorily resolved at the local level, and that may turn out differently in different settings." Miles Christi Religious Order v. Township of Northville, 629 F.3d 533, 537 (6th Cir.2010) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted).
The ripeness of a claim is a legal question that we review de novo. Harris v. Mexican Specialty Foods, Inc., 564 F.3d 1301, 1308 (11th Cir.2009). "In deciding whether a claim is ripe for adjudication or review, we look primarily at two considerations: 1) the fitness of the issues for judicial decision, and 2) the hardship to the parties of withholding court consideration." Midrash Sephardi, Inc. v. Town of Surfside, 366 F.3d 1214, 1224 (11th Cir.2004). In addition, the unique demand for a concrete factual context in certain land use disputes has led "[m]any of our sister circuits" to apply Williamson County's final decision requirement to certain RLUIPA claims challenging the application of land use regulations to a given property. Guatay Christian Fellowship v. County of San Diego, 670 F.3d 957, 977 (9th Cir.2011), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 133 S.Ct. 423, 184 L.Ed.2d 255 (2012); see Miles Christi Religious Order, 629 F.3d at 537-38; Grace Cmty. Church v. Lenox Township, 544 F.3d 609, 617-18 (6th Cir.2008); Murphy v. New Milford Zoning Comm'n, 402 F.3d 342, 351 (2d Cir.2005) (applying Williamson County after making a two-part preliminary inquiry); see also Congregation Anshei Roosevelt v. Planning & Zoning Bd., 338 Fed.Appx. 214, 219 (3d Cir. 2009) (affirming dismissal of RLUIPA claim as unripe based upon Williamson County). Williamson County provides that a landowner must "obtain[] a final decision regarding the application of the zoning ordinance ... to its property" before his or her claim ripens into one justiciable in federal court. 473 U.S. at 186, 105 S.Ct. at 3116; see Guatay, 670 F.3d at 979 (explaining that a final decision can be obtained by filing "a variance application, a special use permit application, or ... a single appeal of a denied permit"). In addition to RLUIPA claims, many courts have likewise applied Williamson County's finality principles to related constitutional and statutory challenges to the application of local land use regulations, including substantive due process, equal protection, and First Amendment claims. See, e.g., Guatay, 670 F.3d at 979; Murphy, 402 F.3d at 350 ("[W]e do not believe it necessary to distinguish the RLUIPA claim from the First Amendment Free Exercise claim when it comes to our ripeness inquiry.").
As explained earlier, under traditional principles of ripeness, "we inquire into 1) whether the issues are fit for judicial decision and 2) the hardship to the parties of withholding court consideration." Konikov, 410 F.3d at 1322. In the First Amendment context, our ripeness review is at its most charitable, and should any significant doubt prevail, we will resolve it in favor of justiciability. See Harrell v. Fla. Bar, 608 F.3d 1241, 1258 (11th Cir. 2010); Beaulieu v. City of Alabaster, 454 F.3d 1219, 1227 (11th Cir.2006) ("Because this case involves an alleged violation of the First Amendment, our review of this suit's ripeness is at its most permissive."). Although the district court characterized the Temple's complaint as primarily concerning its inability to expand because of the historic designation, a close reading of the complaint reveals that the Temple's challenge is better characterized as alleging that the mere enactment of the resolution declaring it to be a historic landmark violates RLUIPA, FRFRA, and the Constitution.
It is readily apparent under traditional notions of ripeness that, on the issue of whether the City designated the Temple to be a historic site for discriminatory reasons, the record is sufficiently developed so as to render that issue fit for judicial resolution. The Temple challenges the mere fact that it has been designated historic — so framed, that issue became as ripe as it will ever be the moment the Temple was initially designated a landmark. No further factual development is necessary.
The First Circuit's recent decision in Roman Catholic Bishop, a case bearing facts similar to those of the present case, fortifies our view. In that case, the Roman Catholic Bishop of Springfield (Bishop) brought RLUIPA and constitutional claims against the City of Springfield (Springfield) challenging the "enforcement of a City ordinance that created a single-parcel historic district encompassing a church owned by [the Bishop]." 724 F.3d at 83, 2013 WL 3782025, at *1. The court first held that "those of [the Bishop's] claims which depend on the potential consequences of compliance with the ordinance are not ripe for adjudication, because [the Bishop] has not yet devised [his] plans for the church nor submitted any application to the [Springfield Historical Commission]." Id. However, insofar as the Bishop's complaint could be read to allege "that the mere existence of the Ordinance create[d] a ripe controversy, [the court] f[ound] that [the Bishop's] claims [we]re ripe." Id. at 92, 2013 WL 3782025, at *9. The court reasoned that because the challenges to the mere enactment of the landmarking resolution "rest[ed] solely on the existence of the Ordinance, no further factual development [was] necessary, and the Ordinance's existence ... confront[ed] [the Bishop] with a direct and immediate dilemma." Id. (internal quotation marks omitted).
We likewise conclude that the Temple's RLUIPA, FRFRA, and constitutional attacks on the mere fact of its designation as a historic landmark satisfy the fitness and hardship requirements of our traditional ripeness jurisprudence, and that the Temple's claims in this regard are therefore ripe for judicial review. See id.; see also Eide v. Sarasota County, 908 F.2d 716, 726 (11th Cir.1990) ("[I]f a landowner's initial application for commercial zoning had been rejected ... simply because the landowner was a redhead, the landowner's arbitrary and capricious due process claim challenging that action would be ripe."). The Temple alleges a present injury from the City's discriminatory designation of its property as historic, and to delay the resolution of these claims where no further factual development is possible would serve only to work further hardship upon the Temple. That we will not do. See Roman Catholic Bishop, 724 F.3d at 92-93, 2013 WL 3782025, at *9 (holding that the designation of a church as a historic landmark was ripe in part because the designation "presently imposes delay, uncertainty, and expense, which is sufficient to show present injury"); see also Harrell, 608 F.3d at 1258 (discerning no ripeness problems where plaintiff's void-for-vagueness challenge claimed an immediate injury); Nat'l Adver. Co. v. City of Miami, 402 F.3d 1335, 1339 (11th Cir. 2005) (per curiam) ("When a plaintiff is challenging a governmental act, the issues are ripe for judicial review if a plaintiff shows he has sustained, or is in immediate danger of sustaining, a direct injury as the result of that act." (alternations and internal quotation marks omitted)); cf. Primera Iglesia Bautista Hispana of Boca Raton, Inc. v. Broward County, 450 F.3d 1295,
We hasten to note the limited nature of our decision in this case. We take no position whatever on the ultimate merits of the Temple's challenge to its designation as a historic site. We merely hold that in the limited manner outlined above, the Temple's complaint alleges a dispute sufficiently concrete to render the instant controversy ripe and justiciable without further delay. Whether the Temple can make a colorable showing that the City has violated the Constitution or the substantial burden and equal terms provisions of RLUIPA — and whether the Temple's claims are even cognizable under the statutory and constitutional provisions it invokes in its complaint — are questions we leave in the capable hands of the district court for resolution in the first instance.
The district court also dismissed the Temple's facial void-for-vagueness challenge to City Ordinance Section 171-5 because, after finding the Temple's as-applied challenges to the historical designation were unripe, the court concluded that prudential considerations counseled in favor of postponing judicial intervention on that sole remaining claim. Because we find that the Temple's as-applied challenges to its designation as a historic site are ripe for adjudication, the prudential concerns that animated the dismissal of this count are no longer present.
We do not know who will ultimately prevail between the Temple and the City in this ongoing feud. That question — a merits one — is not ours to answer. We merely decide today that the claims enumerated in the Temple's complaint are ripe for judicial adjudication. And while we embrace some hope that the parties might bury their strife before the next stage of federal litigation comes to pass,