by Karen on January 22, 2009
This should cause great wailing and gnashing of teeth:
San Francisco will try to collect up to $15 million in taxes from the Archdiocese of San Francisco, which is refusing to pay certain taxes on properties the church is transferring from one Catholic nonprofit organization to another.
That tax bill would be the second largest of its kind in San Francisco history. But the archdiocese has appealed the charge, saying the church should be exempt from property transfer taxes for a variety of reasons – primarily because the properties are being moved among groups that all are a part of the same overarching organization: the Archdiocese of San Francisco.
The church, as you can probably guess, has decided to take the position that it is being persecuted for it’s involvement in stripping the gay and lesbian community of California of their civil rights.
by Karen on November 26, 2008
The Freedom of Religion Foundation has filed a lawsuit against Rancho Cucomonga in the wake of their billboard being taken down after someone in city hall made an inquiry about taking it down.
Though the city is denying that they had anything to do with it, the Daily Bullinten quoted Linda Daniels, the Redevelopment Director, as saying:
“We contacted the sign company and asked if there was a way to get it removed,”
If “we” doesn’t mean the city, someone needs to step up and explain exactly who these “we” are. Because as it stands, Linda Daniels is listed on the city’s site as an employee of the city.
The city’s official response seems to be that the billboard company just up and decided to take the sign down itself as you can see from the following email I recieved after complaining about their involvement.
Thank you so much for your inquiry regarding the “No Religion” billboard and the media’s coverage regarding its removal. For the record, we would like to inform you that the City of Rancho Cucamonga did notsuggest, nor did it request, that any billboard content be removed from the billboard. Advertising content decisions rest with the company that sells the advertising space, not with the City. The placement and removal of advertising content is a private business decision.
The City of Rancho Cucamonga supports freedom of speech and expression. It does not have any authority over the content of any billboard, and
does not involve itself in private business transactions between
companies that provide billboard advertising and companies/organizations that desire to utilize billboards for advertising purposes. The City of Rancho Cucamonga has NO role in controlling billboard content.
I don’t buy it. Daniel’s was either misquoted or the “we” in her statement refers to the city (aka: her employer). IMHO, any request she makes of a private company in her official capacity is a request by the city. The FFRF should win this one.
by Karen on November 24, 2008
One week after being put up in Rancho Cucamonga, California, the Imagine No Religion billboard, shown to the left, by the Freedom From Religion Foundation has been taken down. It would be one thing if the company who owned the billboard had taken it down on their own.
However, it’s another thing when the company does so after city hall asks if there’s a way to get it removed.
A billboard with the message “Imagine No Religion” is no more.
Sign company General Outdoor removed the sign by the Freedom From Religion Foundation on Thursday after it received a request by the city to do so.
According to Redevelopment Director Linda Daniels, City Hall had received 90 calls of complaint since Wednesday.
“We contacted the sign company and asked if there was a way to get it removed,” Daniels said.
This is the first time the sign has been removed since the campaign started and I think it’s pretty obvious that the sign would still be up if the local government had not gotten involved.
If you’d like to send a complaint (a polite one, of course) you can send it from this page on Atheists United. The FFRF has issued a statement and has also put up the address of the billboard company if you’d like to send a complaint to them also.
