Seventh Day Baptist Church of Daytona Beach will be allowed to resume weekly free food giveaways through its small food pantry following a year-long battle with the city concerning a ban on redevelopment-area church food pantries.
The church is dropping its lawsuit against the city of Daytona Beach, which was filed in April 2024 — six months after the city ordered the church to shut down its food pantry over a local law that banned church food pantries in the city’s five redevelopment areas. As part of the recent resolution, the city will also enter into a formal settlement agreement, according to The Daytona Beach News-Journal.
The agreement will include the city repealing its ordinance, Daytona Beach attorney Chobee Ebbets, who has represented Seventh Day Baptist pro bono, told the outlet. “It's a big win,” Ebbets added. “That sweet little church will be able to feed people again.”
Seventh Day Baptist Church’s food pantry was shut down in October 2023 following complaints from a family living near the church. One family member sent an email to the city last September, saying he saw a woman camped out on the sidewalk in front of his house the previous week “waiting for the food pantry to open,” per an April report from The Daytona Beach News-Journal. He added that a mailman told him that no deliveries were made on the days the pantry was open “because of the line of people waiting for food.”
At the time, Ebbets called the city’s ordinance “overbroad, arbitrary, capricious, discriminatory, and selective” and said it was used to take advantage of the church in a manner that amounted to “an unlawful exercise of the city's police powers.”
The law itself was passed in August 2011 and banned the opening of food pantries, which the city defines as a community distribution center that receives food through donations, food retailers or food banks and distributes them to individuals in need. City officials said food pantries located in redevelopment areas “can be detrimental to the difficult task of reviving a struggling area,” The Daytona Beach News-Journal reported. Food pantries that were legally established as an accessory use before July 20, 2011, were exempted by the city under the new law. Same with food pantries as an accessory use to places of worship that are not located within a redevelopment area.
Seventh Day Baptist Church is located in the city's Downtown Community Redevelopment Area. Issues arose when the nearby Christian Church was allowed to promptly reopen its food pantry after being shut down last fall. The fact that Seventh Day Baptist Church was not allowed to reopen its pantry raised questions — and plenty of concerns.
The church filed a lawsuit after it failed to reach an agreement with the city. It was seeking a declaratory judgment and an injunction, but no damages.
Seventh Day Baptist Church first opened its food pantry in 2006 and relocated to its current address in February 2021. The church was under the assumption that it could continue running its food pantry even after it changed locations.
In response to the recent news, Seventh Day Baptist Senior Pastor Ben Figueroa proudly told The Daytona Beach News-Journal, “This little David defeated Goliath. God is the one who did it. He used Chobee.”
Seventh Day Baptist Church was able to reopen its food pantry less than three weeks after it received additional help from First Liberty Institute, a nonprofit Christian conservative legal organization based in Texas, and the Chicago-based law firm Sidley Austin LLP. First Liberty Institute and Sidley Austin LLP filed a motion in federal court at the end of August urging the city to end its ban on the church's free food pantry.
According to The Daytona Beach News-Journal, it’s not clear at this time whether city commissioners will have to vote to repeal the ordinance in the city's redevelopment areas. It’s also unclear when that vote might occur.
