A federal trial started Tuesday, more than three years after a local church was rejected from renting space to worship at Hermon High School.
Pines Church, now based in Bangor, sued the Hermon School Department in May 2023, alleging the school committee rejected the church’s request for a yearlong lease to use the high school auditorium for Sunday services due to conservative beliefs about sexual identity and contraceptives.
The school committee offered a month-to-month lease after denying a year-long one in December 2022, but the church did not accept. At the time the church held services in an Orono movie theater.
Pastor Matt Gioia testified Tuesday that a year-long lease allows the church to plan and advertise services.
The church claims the board’s rejection of a year-long lease violated protections under the 1st and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution and the accommodation guarantees in the Maine Human Rights Act.
A bench trial started Tuesday morning before U.S. District Court of Maine Judge Lance Walker. Gioia and three school committee members testified. They discussed their recollections of the discussions around the lease and the church.
Gioia’s attorney, Julianne Fleischer, asked what he thought when he received an email from a former board member, Christopher McLaughlin, that asked the church’s beliefs about same-sex marriage, abortion access, gender affirming medical care, conversion therapy for LGBTQ+ people and sex education for youth.
“I just scratched my head and I was asking myself what does this have to do with seeking a lease?” Gioia said. “I’ve never been asked these questions from any lease I’ve ever entered into.”
Gioia, who testified for nearly two hours, said he did not expect to have to answer those types of questions. He is represented by Advocates for Faith and Freedom, a nonprofit California law firm that says it’s “passionate about preserving religious liberty in the legal system.”
“I knew it was a violation of our religious freedom,” Gioia said. “I was shocked when I received these questions and I was confused.”
Former school committee member Haily Keezer testified about her concerns with how the potential lease was handled.
She said she emailed then-Superintendent Micah Grant to raise those concerns, “So we could prevent where we are today.”
School committee member Stephanie Oiler outlined her concerns about how many people may be in the school on a weekend and potential parking issues. On Sundays a different organization used the gym.
One reason for denying the year-long lease was the lack of availability for school custodial staff to open the building and clean up after the event, multiple witnesses testified. Gioia said he offered to pay $1,000 a week — more than the $750 the school requested — to help with that concern.
In videos of the 2022 committee meetings, Oiler brought up concerns about 15 people at the church coming down with the stomach flu at once and what would happen after. Fleischer, the church’s attorney, questioned if that was something Oiler had ever seen happen.
Oiler said it happened with one of her kid’s middle school classes, where multiple students were all sick and that it’s an issue that can happen semi-regulary in schools.
Also at those meetings, high school Principal Brian Walsh told the committee about his concern that the school would be affiliated with the church’s beliefs. Gioia testified that he was not allowed to address those concerns at the meeting, despite the fact that he had “valid answers.”
Former school committee chairman Jesse Keith explained that members of the public who aren’t on the agenda are typically not allowed to speak during meetings except during public comment.
Keith’s testimony is expected to continue Wednesday morning.